


Junk of the Heart

by BeyoncesThighGap



Category: RWBY
Genre: 2 lazy 2 tag especially because they'll be minor, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Various Others - Freeform, White Rose Week 2018, multiple AUs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-20 11:34:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14893862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeyoncesThighGap/pseuds/BeyoncesThighGap
Summary: Prompts from White Rose Week 2018





	1. Day 1: Partnership/Teamwork

**Author's Note:**

> here's the brooklyn 99 inspired au that like, no one but me wants. and also maybe raiyu.  
> grazie to them, mchandraws, cafloopy, cha/tea-ray, and mamakatie for being bad bitches and supporting me.

_Anyone but Rose, anyone but Rose…_ Weiss pleads mentally, watching her precinct’s Sergeant, Pyrrha Nikos, write case partners on a whiteboard. _Please God, Buddha, Allah, Satan, anyone who’s listening; have mercy! I’ll take anyone over Rose. Xiao Long, Valkyrie, hell I’d even take Arc! Just please, do not let my case partner be-_

“Rose, Schnee. You two will be investigating the murder of Marcus Black down on 83rd street.”

_Fuck._

-

“Detective Schnee, can you join me in my office for a second?” Sergeant Nikos calls out into the bullpen, startling Weiss from her conversation with detective Blake Belladonna. Dark eyebrows raise at their sergeant’s tone, lips quirking slightly at the aghast expression on Weiss’s face. Blake’s mouth opens, just about to begin teasing her usual case partner about her reaction, before the smaller detective cuts her off forcefully.

“Don’t you start, Belladonna,” Weiss growls as she stands from her chair, smoothing down her skirt and blouse to make sure that her appearance is perfect. “I’m sure the sergeant just wants to explain to me why she placed Rose and I on a case together even though she knows that that… _child_ is impossible to work with.”

A snort of laughter is her only answer, and Weiss huffs as she turns on her heel and stalks across the bullpen. The large lobby where detectives and bluecoats often mingled while bringing perpetrators in or filing paperwork is relatively empty for a weekday, with only four of the usual seven detectives lingering in Weis’s field of vision. Detectives Ren Lie and Nora Valkyrie are dragging an arson suspect back towards the interrogation rooms, with Ren’s usual apathetic mask in place. His partner, on the other hand, causes a small spark of fear to run down Weiss’s spine at the absolute manic look in her eye.

Weiss lets her eyes skip over detectives Jaune Arc and Yang Xiao Long once she sees that the blonde duo are both at their respective desks, typing away rapidly on their computers. Happy to see that the two seem engaged in paperwork for once, Weiss decides she can take a slight detour to the side of the room where the detectives’ desks make their homes. Approaching from the side, Weiss opens her mouth to deliver a well-deserved “congratulations” at the pair before it is replace with a dry “you’ve got to be kidding me.”

In place of work on Detective Xiao Long’s screen is a video game, although Weiss isn’t entirely sure what she’s playing. Everything seems to be made of crude cubes, even the creatures Yang is chasing around with a poorly-animated weapon. A pickaxe, maybe? Turning to her right to glance at Jaune’s computer and seeing the same game, Weiss barely contains a squawk of indignation at the pair’s disrespect for their workplace.

“What are you two doing?” Weiss asks with a scowl, watching with slight satisfaction as Detective Arc jumps at the sound of her voice.

“W-weiss! Er, Detective Schnee! Hey! We were just, um… y’know. Doing some paperwork?” The man answers meekly, shooting a nervous glance at his blonde counterpart. “Right, Yang?”

Without stopping her incessant clacking, Yang lets a short “nope” fall from her lips, much to the chagrin of Weiss and shock of Jaune. “We’re on a break, shortstack, chill out. The Sarge said we could play on the computers during our downtime as long as we didn’t get any viruses on them.”

Scoffing, Weiss turns to make her way back towards her sergeant’s office, grumbling an unhappy “we’ll see about that,” and scowling at Yang’s thrown “Bye-bye, Ice Queen!”

After successfully maneuvering around the mess of paperwork and wandering bluecoats, Weiss arrives outside of Pyrrha’s office and frets over her attire in the mirror. It’s no secret that Pyrrha Nikos is one of the most decorated Sergeants in all of Vale, and at the mere age of 28! Pyrrha is Weiss’s idol and the younger woman strives to be as revered as her sergeant is someday. Although she doesn’t know if that can be accomplished if Sergeant Nikos insists on having Weiss babysit Ruby Rose of all people. She figures some of that behavior stems from her older sister, based on Yang’s work ethic. After Weiss’s knock is met with a bubbly “come in!” she crosses the threshold and closes the door behind her, smoothing her skirt under her legs once Pyrrha motions for her inferior to sit.

Weiss lets her eyes dart around the office quickly, trying to deduce what might have lead to this impromptu meeting. Seeing that Pyrrha opens her desk and pulls out a file, Weiss’s mind begins to whir into action immediately. The Marcus Black case file? No, there was no way. The manilla envelope was way too small to contain something as valuable as murder documents. Maybe Weiss was getting a raise? Impossible, paychecks had just gone out a week prior, and if Weiss was due for an increase in pay she’d have received it by now. Catching a glimpse at the black words sharpied onto the top, Weiss feels her eyes widen and her face pale.

_Crap._

“Detective Schnee, do you know why I called you in here?” Sergeant Nikos starts coolly, settling the file face up and towards Weiss, the words “Colleague Evaluations” painting themselves behind her eyelids. At Weiss’s stunned silence, Pyrrha raises one red brow and spurs Weiss’s mouth into action.

“I have an idea, ma’am.”

“Do you remember when we had to write colleague evaluations in the summer, Detective?”

“Yes ma’am.”

Slowly opening the manilla envelope and bringing out one lone piece of paper, Pyrrha lets her eyes scan it before emerald and blue lock. “And do you remember what you wrote in yours about Detective Rose?”

“...vaguely, ma’am,” Weiss replies meekly, feeling her shoulders hunch together under her sergeant’s powerful gaze.

“Let’s give you a refresher then, shall we?” Pyrrha asks with a smile as she pushes the paper towards Weiss and sits back in her chair, waiting for her detective to read her own words. Feeling her cheeks flush with humiliation, Weiss picks up the nearly blank piece of paper and skims the information she’d written ten months prior.

Name: Ruby Rose  
Occupation: Detective for the City of Vale’s 18th precinct  
Age: 23, youngest detective on the force  
Height: Approximately 66.6 inches  
Appearance: dark brown hair with unprofessional red tips styled in an (immature and messy bob), gray eyes, always wearing the same red sweatshirt  
Attitude: Childish, irksome, annoying  
Work Ethic: Sloppy  
Known Family: Yang Xiao-Long, half-sister  
Likes: Making a mess, sweets, goofing off  
Dislikes: Actually doing her job

Although Weiss is sure you could cook an egg on her face due to her shame, Pyrrha motions for her to pick up another paper that she’d set in front of Weiss as she read. Shocked to see her own name as the subject of the paper, Weiss feels her irritation grow with every line that she reads about herself from her colleague’s point of view.

Name: Weiss Schnee  
Occupation: Detective for the City of Vale’s 18th precinct  
Age: 24, but she acts 50  
Height: Approximately 61 inches  
Appearance: blue eyes, scar over left eye, waist length white hair (probably all the stress from being lame), dresses like a librarian  
Attitude: Cocky, snooty, know-it-all doo-doo head  
Work Ethic: Obsessive  
Known Family: Winter Schnee, Atlesian Chief of Police, and Satan probably  
Likes: Work, herself  
Dislikes: Anything fun

Scowling fiercely, Weiss directs her gaze back towards her amused sergeant. “She’s such a child, ma’am! How could you make us partners on this case after reading our evaluations and seeing that we’re obviously not fond of each other?”

“That’s precisely why I did it, Detective.”

At the flabbergasted silence, Pyrrha chuckles before reaching into her manilla envelope and pulling out a fresh piece of paper. “I want you and Rose to grow as colleagues, people, and hopefully as partners. This won’t be the last time you two will have to work together.” Weiss lets out a pathetic whine at that, and her seregant rolls her emerald eyes at Weiss’s childish display. “Despite her age, and your obvious doubts, Ruby is an extremely talented detective. She’s the youngest one on our force for a reason.” Handing the paper over to a still silent Weiss, Pyrrha smiles sweetly. “Don’t judge a book by its cover, Weiss. You never know what kind of secrets may lay in its pages.”

Knowing a dismissal when she hears one, Weiss raises from her seat with a sigh and a nod. Halfway out the door, Pyrrha lets out a “Weiss, wait!” that halts the younger girls in her tracks. “Can you send Ruby in here, please?”

Scowling at the beaming smile Pyrrha shoots her paired with her famous “I’m sorry!” chasing her out the door, Weiss leaves the office and begins her search for her wayward partner.

Making her way towards Ruby’s desk, Weiss lets her eyes jump around the bullpen incase she spots the telltale bob of her young colleague. After her search comes up empty, Weiss spots Nora coming from the direction of the interrogation room. Rushing to catch up to the red head before she can disappear into the restroom, Weiss stops as a flash of darker red catches her attention. Turning and making her way towards the file room, Weiss peeks inside and is surprised at what she finds.

Instead of being asleep or snacking like Weiss would have expected, Ruby is pouring over a case file and jotting down notes at a speed so incredible that Weiss’s hand aches in sympathy. Ruby stops momentarily to take a sip of her coffee, gray and blue meeting for a moment and startling both of their owners. Ruby chokes on her mouthful of the juice of life and begins coughing immediately, moving her mouth away from the files in order to keep them clean.

Attempting, and failing, at holding back her giggles Weiss pulls a crumpled napkin from her skirt pocket and offers it to her dying partner in apology, accepting the scowl that she gets in return.

“Can I help you with something, Detective, or do you always lurk around waiting to scare innocent women?” Ruby snarks between coughs, cheeks pink both in embarrassment and loss of air.

With a smirk at the detective’s obvious embarrassment, Weiss makes her way over to peer down at whatever had Ruby’s hand flying at a million words per minute. Feeling her brows creep towards her hairline in surprise, Weiss picks up the case file and skims it before glancing back at Ruby’s handiwork.

“Is… are these notes on the Marcus Black case?” Weiss asks, letting her shock seep into her tone. “We just got this assignment not even an hour ago and you already have almost the entire file summarized with potential leads and suspects?”

Wiping her mouth clean of residual coffee, Ruby nods firmly before pointing at a name that lay under the “Suspects” and “Leads” columns. “Yup. I think his son did it. Maybe had some help from a friend.”

Flabbergasted, Weiss squints over the notes and reread them quickly, trying to see where her partner got that from. “Why do you say that?”

“His father was a fan favorite at the bar over on 36th. Patrons said he practically lived there. Whenever he _did_ go home, he’d always return to the bar with stories of his ‘good for nothing kid’ and how he wished he could just ‘beat the crap out of his useless ass.’” Ruby states matter of factly, sifting through pictures of the crime scene and suspects. Pulling out a full body shot of a man who looked to be around late teens or early twenties, Ruby motions towards the bottom half of his picture. “He doesn’t hold himself naturally, which means he’s either injured and didn’t heal properly or he has prosthetics.”

Raising it up to eye level and squinting, Weiss taps at the exposed ‘skin’ between his jeans and running shoes. “Unless he’d been standing around in paint lately, I don’t think his ankles should be gray.”

A slow grin began to form on Ruby’s face, spreading to Weiss like the plague. Suddenly Detective Rose is no longer her annoying colleague, but an equal. Someone who enjoys detective work as much as Weiss does, and is more than willing to put in the work to solve cases. Detective Schnee is no longer Ruby’s overbearing superior, but someone who she wouldn’t mind working more cases with in the future. Her eyes no longer remind Ruby of frigid ice, but of the sky during a cloudless day.

Pulling out some more files, Ruby points out past police reports filed against the Black household. “Noise complaints, tax evasion, thievery, public intoxication, driving under the influence… these boys had a lot stacked up against them.”

“When the first responders searched the house, did they find any incriminating evidence against Black’s son?”

“Mercury.”

 

“Sorry. Did they find any incriminating evidence against Mercury Black?” As Ruby is pulling a different file out and passing it to Weiss, the shorter girl stops to ask, “Did you go and get all these files on Mercury on your own?”

A low affirmative hum is Weiss’s answer, motioning towards the stack of files she had yet to notice. “S’not just Mercury here, I grabbed files on all of the suspects that had police records.” Letting out a small ‘aha!’ as Ruby yanked free a different file. “Here, Mercury’s best friend. Emerald Sustrai. Has quite the portfolio involving multiple thievery accusations, but none were ever proven. Also has a few possessional charges.”

“Doesn’t exactly hang out with the best crowd, does he?”

Nodding her agreement, Weiss hears Ruby shuffling around behind the table they’re standing at and she peeks over. “What are you doing?”

Her partner looks up from where she was gathering her things and messily stuffing them into a bag. “Uh, getting ready to go and question the leads? This murder isn’t going to solve itself, Detective Schnee.”

At the use of her work title, Weiss is snapped from the trance she falls under when working exciting cases. She shakes her head, attempting to clear her thoughts of messy hair and wise eyes colored such a clear gray they look almost silver. “O-oh, shit. Pardon my language, I just completely forgot the reason I even came here. Sergeant Nikos wants to speak to you.”

A raised eyebrow and playful smirk are waiting for Weiss at the end of her sentence. “You, _the_ Detective Schnee, forgetting something? Mark this down on the calendars!”

“Oh, ha ha,” Weiss laughs monotonously, sticking her tongue out for good measure. “I just got excited at the prospect of closing this case so soon. You found a lot of solid leads.”

“Ah, right. The sooner we close this case, the sooner we’ll be rid of each other.”

Ice floods through Weiss’s veins at the words, and she suddenly remembers who she’s reviewing files with. Ruby Rose, apparently one of the brightest up and coming detectives, but acts like she’s stuck in high school. Childish, annoying, and borderline rude with how little formal etiquette she enacts into her daily life. Her eyes no longer remind Weiss of liquid mercury, but cold and unforgiving gunmetal.

“Right.”

Gray and blue lock in a battle of wills for what seems like hours, both waiting for the other to give in. Finally, Ruby lets out a soft ‘tch’ of annoyance and turns to leave, holding the door open with her foot as she peaks her head back through the doorway. “Oh, Detective? Can you sort the files for me while I’m with the sarge? I have a feeling we may take a while.” 

Opening her mouth to refuse, Ruby blows Weiss a kiss and shouts “Thanks a bunches!” before making her escape down the hall, successfully cutting Weiss off.

Scowling at the doorway, Weiss mumbles an angry “dolt” before stacking the files up neatly and setting them into piles based on relevance and need. Just because her and Ruby couldn’t get along didn’t mean that their work ethic needed to suffer.

-

Their work ethic was most definitely suffering.

After Ruby returned from Sergeant Nikos’s office, her will to run out into the field and gather witness statements was as dead as Mercury Black himself. Weiss winced at her own dark thoughts, smacking her hand lightly as punishment. Whatever the sergeant had said to the other girl had soured her mood immensely, which in turn ruined Weiss’s mood. It took them days to stop snapping at each other, and even then it was only because everyone else in the office was tired of their bickering.

Nora had the audacity to yell “Just kiss already!” which had caused a bout of angry yelling so intense the duo had to be pulled into their Captain’s office. His assistant, Oscar, had approached the pair meekly saying that they were to report to Captain Ozpin immediately. He had torn into them with that cool and indifferent ‘I’m very disappointed in you’ tone that Weiss’s own father had used on her countless times. Flashbacks assaulted her every sense during their scolding, and by the time they were dismissed, Weiss could hardly stand.

When the blood had rushed from Weiss’s face after the pair was excused, Ruby had snickered and called her partner ‘vanilla weisscream.’ This wasn’t the first annoying nickname Ruby had given Weiss, but it was certainly the straw that broke the camel’s back. The amount of insults hurled at her all week combined with thoughts of her father and her first genuine scolding from the captain had Weiss ready to burn the entirety of precinct eighteen down with rage.

“All right, that’s it!”

“Watch out, everyone! The ice queen has finally cracked- OW, HEY!” Ruby’s mocking words were cut off with a yelp when Weiss grabbed her by the arm and yanked her to the filing room where they’d first found out they were capable of getting along. “What the hell, Schnee?!”

Startling slightly at the fact that this was as close as she’d ever heard Ruby to cursing, Weiss ignored her desire to poke fun and inhaled roughly. “We need to get over ourselves.”

“No, _you_ need to get over _your_ -”

“ENOUGH!” Weiss yelled, poking her index finger roughly into Ruby’s chest. “We’re acting like children! We’re city renowned detectives, and we can’t stay off of each other’s throats long enough to finish a simple murder case!”

When Ruby went to open her mouth again Weiss actually hissed at her, much to the shock of both parties. “Enough of this ‘I’ and ‘me’ crap. We’re partners, whether we like it or not. It doesn’t have to be forever, but if we can’t learn to get along enough to finish cases, it could negatively affect the precinct. I know you may not be fond of me, but I do know you love the one-eight.”

Grumbling, Ruby sticks her hands in the pockets of her sweatshirt and pouts like a child. Offhandedly, Weiss thinks to herself that Ruby is rather cute when she isn’t running her mouth. When Ruby throws her head back with a sigh and exposes her neck, Weiss notices just how much taller the younger detective is than herself. Before her thoughts can stray any further, Ruby lets her head fall back into its natural position and blows her bangs moodily out of her eyes. “So you’re asking for a truce?”

“I’m asking for us to be civil with one another. I don’t want this to only last for the Black case. I want us to be able to put aside our differences whenever the sarge or captain ask to work together or fill out collegiate review forms.”

A heavy silence descends on the pair then, both weighing what has been said. While it’s true that on their own they were both great detectives, together they were turning out to be no better than a new recruit. Their styles and attitudes were constantly clashing, and with each new fight or grumbled comment, Sergeant Nikos grew more and more disappointed in her top detectives.

After a minute or two of thoughtful silence, Ruby holds out her hand with a lopsided grin. “Partners?”

Weiss lets a small smile slip onto her face then, looking up into silver eyes for what feels like the first time in days. “Partners.”

-

Weiss and Ruby make eye contact on opposite sides of the doorway, nodding to each other to signal that they are both ready for what awaits them. It had taken weeks for the duo to gather all of the information they would need to bring Mercury Black and Emerald Sustrai down without room for questions on their innocence. During those long hours at the office, Detectives Schnee and Rose had learned to see past each other’s work personas and get to know the people they truly were.

Countless days and nights spent at the precinct caused the two to become quite close, with the pair only fighting when they got particularly snappy with each other or for the sake of their own amusement. It wasn’t as if they no longer got on each other’s nerves, they’d just managed to perfect their routine as teammates.

Ruby turns to their assembled squad and counts down from three before kicking down the door with all of the childish flair she is known for. Weiss follows her in with a small chuckle, sobering up once she makes eye contact with panicked red eyes as their owner begins to hide the abundance of illegal drugs spread out on the small coffee table in front of her.

“Vale PD, freeze!”

The sound of smashing glass fills the panicked noise of the apartment, and Weiss yells “We’ve got a runner!” as she moves forward to apprehend Emerald, shoving her down onto the sofa and turning the girl so she isn’t being smothered. “Ruby, go-”

Before Weiss can finish her sentence, she checks over her shoulder and sees that Ruby is gone. Gunfire from the alley outside the apartment reaches her ears, and Weiss begins to panic immediately, going to help Ruby before she remembers she has a criminal underneath her. “Shit!”

The walkie talkie at Weiss’s hips begin to static immediately, a choppy shout of “10-72” reaching the detective’s ears. Motioning a bluecoat over to the downed girl, Weiss fires off her Miranda rights quickly in an effort to get to the gunfight outside. “You have the right to remain silent. If you give up the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law,” cuffs are brought out from Weiss’s belt and slapped onto limp wrists, the sounds of fighting outside causing Weiss’s words to speed up and become panicked. “You have the right to an attorney. If you desire an attorney and cannot afford one, an attorney will be obtained for you before police questioning.”

One last gunshot echoes through the apartment before it goes silent, and Weiss shoves Emerald Sustrai’s body towards her comrades in blue. “Watch over her, and bag the rest of those drugs. I think she’s so compliant because she’s high as fuck.”

“True that,” Emerald laughs from her place slumped over on the floor. She shakes her hands for emphasis, causing her cuffs to rattle in the quiet of the apartment. “I’m high as a kite.”

Laughing slightly, the bluecoat in charge of Emerald, Ilia if she remembered correctly, guides the green-haired girl into a sitting position. “Might wanna watch your words, there. ‘Anything can and will be used against you,’ and all that.”

“I’d sure like it if you were held against me,” Emerald purrs, struggling against her restraints once again. Ilia pinks cutely at the statement and coughs into her hand, grinning shyly at Weiss. The detective rolls her eyes and grumbles ‘get her out of here,’ before raising from her knees and going for the walkie hanging from her waist.

Just as she raises it to speak, it crackles to life and garbles a code that has all of the assembled officers rushing outside to call an ambulance. “We have a 10-53, I repeat, a 10-53.”

Rushing past her colleagues and jumping down the stairs three at a time, Weiss arrives at the scene of the gunfight to blood splattered on the alley floor by some knocked over trash cans. The red triggers something primal inside of Weiss, causing her to begin screaming immediately. “Detective Rose? Rose?! RUBY, WHERE ARE YOU?”

A weak call of “Schnee?” reaches her ears, and Weiss nearly faints from relief. Coming from around the corner is Ruby, panting and wheezing from the intensity of what has just occured. Weiss rushes over to her and envelopes her in a hug, standing on the very tips of her toes in an effort to get closer to her partner. “Oh my God, I thought I’d lost you.”

A forced chuckle reaches Weiss’s ears, and the husk of it sends a thrill down her spine. “You could’ve checked the lost and found for me if that’d happened.”

“You know what? Forget I said anything.”

“Aw, Schnee, c’mon. I was just joshing.”

“No one says that anymore.”

“Yeah but they _could_. And don’t worry. Black is in custody. I grazed his thigh in our wild gun battle and he collapsed. We were right about the prosthetics, by the way.”

Snorting at Ruby’s foolishness, Weiss pulls back to look the other woman over. She is slightly worse for wear, with her jaw heavily bruised and a new limp to her stature. Her knuckles are busted open from a fight, although when Weiss scans Ruby thoroughly she finds no bullet entry or exit wounds. The only blood that can be found on her dark uniform is, presumably, Mercury’s.

Once Weiss looks back into Ruby’s eyes she is met with a playful smirk and light hearted silver, causing the fluttering in Weiss’s chest to start up. The first time it’d happened in response to something Ruby did Weiss had nearly fainted from shock but as the days went on she grew more used to her body’s reactions to the younger woman. Raising a pale brow at Ruby’s grin, Weiss put on her most obnoxious tone to drawl out a, “Yes Detective?”

Smirk widening at her bait being taken, Ruby shrugs easily before throwing her arms out in a lazy pose. “Oh nothing, just gonna say to take a picture if you wanna look so bad. It’ll last longer.”

Clenching her jaw as Ruby laughed loudly at her own joke, Weiss was suddenly struck with a horrible idea. Would it be worth it? Yes. Would it possibly ruin the newfound friendship her and Detective Rose had? Well, also yes. But it’d sure be funny. Right?

Sauntering to her still guffawing partner, Weiss placed her left hand on her chest and tilted her head up at the taller girl, looking at her between her lashes. Ruby’s laugh cut off abruptly and she swallowed harshly, the sound reaching Weiss’s ears due to their close proximity. The heart under her palm began to beat wildly as Weiss leaned closer, and the shorter girl suddenly noticed that Ruby had a handful of light freckles thrown across her cheeks and nose bridge. Once she was as high up as her toes and calves would allow without cramping, Weiss sent Ruby a small smile that caused her breathing to stutter. Parting her lips the older detective smiled wickedly before whispering, “Why would I need a picture of you when the real thing is so much better?”

At the complete surprise that overtook her partner’s face, Weiss fell back onto the balls of her feet with a happy laugh, head still tilted slightly upwards to make up for the height difference. “Bet you didn’t realize I could be cheeky too, huh, Rose?”

Dark eyebrows raise at the challenge, and suddenly warm lips are on Weiss’s own. Her brain is void of all thoughts, and she’s pretty sure her heart stops beating completely. Her senses shut down and reboot, thrumming to the beat of a new drum.

_Ru-by. Ru-by. Ru-by._

Even her heart has decided it likes this new cadence better, happily skipping along to the beat. Just as Ruby is pulling away, Weiss foolishly realizes she’s yet to actually kiss back. Throwing caution to the wind and giving into her heart this one time, she winds her arms around the taller girl’s neck and yanks her back into place before she can disappear. A shocked exhale leaves Ruby’s nose and dances across Weiss’s face before a happy hum takes its place, lean arms finding their place around Weiss’s waist and draw her closer.

After Weiss can deny her lungs their need of oxygen no longer, she pulls back with a panting gasp and keeps her eyes closed, afraid that the moment she opens them it will all fade away and she’ll never be able to work with Detective Rose again.

“Hey,” Ruby whispers softly, and Weiss feels her head being tilted upwards. “Can you do me a favor and open your eyes real quick?”

Accepting the fact that Ruby is about to smack her senseless, Weiss squints at Ruby with a bashful grin. “Yes?”

Hair tousled from the intensity of their back alley kiss, Ruby gets onto one knee like the fool she is and offers Weiss her detective badge in place of a ring. “Partners?”

A laugh bubbles up from Weiss’s throat before she can help it, relief making her body sag and join Ruby in her kneeling position. Holding out her own badge in response, Weiss nods determinedly and shoots the girl a happy smile. “Partners.”


	2. Day 2: Soulmate AU

From the moment you are born, you are assigned to someone. To be another’s perfect match in every sense of the word. The strength that they lack, compassion they crave, or the laughter they need in their darkest moments. From the moment you are born, a metal band is slapped onto your left wrist counting down the amount of time remaining before you meet your “soulmate.”

As time progresses, the amount of people who found the act to be constricting to a person's sense of individuality rose. To be waiting your entire life for one person, who you had to spend the rest of your life with, yet you'd never even properly met them? Who was even in charge of these so called “soulmate bands,” and how did they know to stick you with someone who you’d get along perfectly with?

What if your bracelet was faulty? What if the love you’d spent months, maybe even years, searching for turned out to be a bust? What happens then?

Weiss Schnee had always thought the entire process to be barbaric. She'd read of universes in fairy tales and story books where you were free to find love on your own and not have it assigned to you. Where being heartbroken was a common occurrence, and people fell in and out of love on the daily.

Plus it wasn’t exactly as if she had the perfect track record with soulmates.

At the tender age of five, Weiss learned that her parents were some of the unlucky ones. Partners who could not stroke the embers of their love enough to leave it a burning inferno of passion. People who were not as compatible as The System thought they would be.

They were soulmates who could not _stand_ the sight of each other.

Weiss Schnee was bred out of a sense of duty to society’s views, and not due to her parents love for one another.

Don’t get them wrong, they tried. Weiss has an older sister, Winter, and a younger brother, Whitley. All three of them have soulmate bracelets like everyone else, much to their chagrin. Winter wears hers like a prison sentence, daunting and heavy on her left wrist. There are countless nicks and scratches from where she had tried to pry it off of her skin, leaving the expanse of pale skin marred with an abundance of cuts and scars. Whitley wears his as if it doesn’t exist, barely glancing at the hunk of metal as he goes about his day. He prefers to pretend that it isn’t there in the first place.

Weiss, however, has a different approach to wearing her bracelet.

When her mother and father sat her down to explain how the bracelets work, Weiss remembers becoming enraged as a child. Why did she have to abide by the system that failed her parents, failed all of her siblings, and left them to live in a house devoid of love? She was around seven at the time, but had inherited both of her parent’s unhappiness with The System and its inner workings.

When Weiss, tiny and chubby in the way toddlers usually are, had angrily demanded she didn’t want to wear her bracelet her parents shot her twin smiles of grief. They explained the bracelet only fell off once the timer reaches zero and she had come face-to-face with her soulmate.

“But,” her mother, Willow, interrupted Weiss’s tantrum. “There is… another way.” Weiss remembers the glance her parents had shared then, and even though they hardly spoke in the presence of their children, they were still able to communicate with only their eyes. “We can cover your bracelet. Although if we do that, you don’t get rid of your soulmate entirely.”

Weiss’s father, Jacques, had stepped in then. “You will both be notified that one of you chose to cover your bracelets, and workers from The System will come and give you a pill. You have to take it if you wish to keep your bracelet covered. This pill gives you and your soulmate the ability to communicate with each other by writing on your skin.”

Toddler Weiss had scrunched up her nose then. She may have been young, but she was smart. “So if I cover my bracelet, my soulmate will see anything I draw on myself?”

Her parents nodded then, pride leaking into their gazes at the quick thinking of their little girl. Weiss had nodded then, determined. “Then I’ll never color on myself again! That way I won’t have to meet my dumb soulmate.”

Willow Schnee had chuckled lightly then, pushing Weiss’s hair behind her ear and holding her face in one palm. “Sweetie, your soulmate will still be able to write on their skin to talk to you. It’s done to try and get soulmates used to each other before their countdown finishes and they meet.”

“It was enacted for people who don’t believe in The System and believe it’s a load of crap,” Jacques had told her, with Willow quickly stepping in and telling Weiss that ‘crap’ was _not_ a nice word and that she was not allowed to use it.

Weiss added crap to her mental arsenal immediately, filing it away for things she didn’t like, The System and brussel sprouts for example.

Weiss was given a few days to consider her options. Every time her attention was drawn to the cool metal on her wrist, Weiss grew frustrated and annoyed. Finally, after a mere two hours, her decision had been made.

She would cover up her bracelet and accept the pill.

The System workers were at the Schnee’s doors by the very next day, weilding a thick black scarf and a small container with a white pill capsule. After going over the procedure with her parents and Weiss, the workers handed Weiss the pill and a glass of water. Struggling with the medicine, Weiss coughed a few times before it fell down her throat. There was no going back now. A female worker then kneeled in front of Weiss and showed her the scarf that would adorn her wrist for the foreseeable future. It was tied with a decisive knot, Weiss getting one last glance at the timer on her wrist, and then the workers were gone.

Standing in her living room, Weiss remembers the last numbers she’d see on her wrist flashing before her eyes.

16 03 01 02 18 19 52

-

A couple of days passed before scribbles started showing up on Weiss’s skin, and in no small amount. Plants, stars, stick figures, and smiley faces were a common occurrence. Weiss then learned that not only did soap not wash off her partner’s drawings, but that they would become an everyday occurrence. Throughout her day, a pleasant tingling sensation would start up on wrists, palms, or forearms and when Weiss would glance down at the offending area, a new doodle awaited her.

She tried to ignore them at first, attending her private lessons like she usually did. Once Weiss had decided to cover up her bracelet, her parents had begun paying for tutors to keep their youngest daughter out of school. It wasn’t every day that a child chose to take the pill and scarf over using their actual soulmate bracelet, and the Schnees didn’t want Weiss to suffer for her decision.

On the plus side, they could start grooming Weiss to be the heiress of their family company, which was good enough for Jacques.

Answering questions and doing her assignments became difficult when her skin started to tingle with the onslaught of new drawings every few minutes. Weiss decided that she hated her soulmate and their incessant drawing.

-

Weeks passed before shaky words began appearing dotted along Weiss’s alabaster skin. The first was a poorly scrawled “hi” accompanied by a grinning worm. When no reply came, Weiss’s soulmate continued on with their regularly scheduled doodles. Weiss scoffed at the simple drawings, her soulmate having upped themselves from stick figures and plants to sketching tiny planets, mostly Saturn.

Weiss thinks it’s because it’s the only one with any discernible features.

She went about her life as usual, although sometimes her siblings and parents did give her inked skin dirty looks, as if it was _her_ fault that whoever was on the other side of the red marker never stopped to rest.

-

Months passed before a “hello?” appeared on Weiss’s right palm, small and cramped but easily deciphered. Again, the greeting went unanswered, and drawings continued to be inked onto the young girl’s arms.

Weiss glances at it throughout her day, clenching her jaw once she realizes the writing being on her hand makes her soulmate a leftie just like her. That explained why drawings had begun fading from the left side of her body and popping up on her right instead. Whoever her soulmate was, they weren’t ambidextrous.

-

Once a month some form of written communication was etched onto Weiss’s skin, and once a month it went ignored and unanswered.

She refused to let other people decide who she would spend the rest of her life with, especially after she knew it wasn’t always destined to be a successful match. Weiss’s life would be in her control and no one else’s.

All the young heiress wanted to do was attend to her studies, practice her singing, and learn some piano.

She never asked for a rowdy partner with a penchant for doodles.

-

After years of silence on her end, Weiss found the words “are you even alive?” scribbled onto the back of her hand. Before her eyes, more words began to pop up. “That would really suck if you were dead. Can you please give me a sign that you haven't been eaten by a wolf or something?” Her partner’s handwriting had really improved over the years, even if it retained the same childlike scrawl Weiss now easily associated with them. There was still the occasional smudging that most southpaws had to suffer with when writing, but all in all it was pretty legible.

Rolling her eyes, Weiss decided to humor her supposed soulmate by writing back. This didn't mean she tolerated them or anything! She just wanted to know a little about the person who was constantly drawing on their skin and couldn’t take silence as a hint. “Why didn't you just check your bracelet to see if the numbers were still counting down?” Satisfied with her remark, Weiss twirled her marker around her fingers to wait for a reply. Cerulean eyes watched her arm for a good hour before becoming frustrated with the lack of response. She continued about her day in a horrible mood, and snapped at almost everyone who spoke to her, including her tutors. Just as Weiss was climbing into bed, set on ignoring her soulmate once more, she saw ink lines appear under her forearm.

“I covered my bracelet once I was told that you had covered yours.”

Puzzled, Weiss put her momentary anger at being left waiting aside to ask “why?” Words started forming as soon as her marker stopped moving, as if her partner had been waiting for Weiss to respond.

“I didn't think it was fair that you didn't get to know when we would meet but I did.”

Shocked at the thoughtfulness, Weiss laid down her writing utensil, refusing to write back. She didn’t owe them anything, after all. She was only replying because she felt particularly nice earlier in the day. Once she awoke the next morning, she saw a simple “thank you for finally answering” on the inside of her wrist. Weiss didn't notice that she completed her entire morning routine with a soft smile on her face until she passed by a mirror, quickly placing a cool mask in its place.

-

By the time Weiss turned thirteen, she and her soulmate were writing to each other almost every day. Weiss didn't like them or anything! She just enjoyed the constant companionship her “soulmate” provided.

Being homeschooled was lonely, after all.

They learned small things about the other, like favorite colors, books, habits, routines, and the names of each other’s best friends. Weiss hesitated when she had scribbled ‘Klein,’ but her soulmate had accepted it without another word. They agreed early on in their time of speaking to not reveal their names, ages, or genders to the other. They were barely becoming friends, after all. More serious information would be released if and when they both saw fit.

-

Weiss’s seventeenth birthday came and went, and she learned that her soulmate was two years younger than she was, partially explaining why the handwriting that had first appeared on Weiss’s skin was so scribbly and sloppy. Still no names or genders from either of them. Still no falling in love on Weiss’s part.

“Is it weird having me being younger than you?”

Weiss had regarded that statement thoughtfully, tapping her black pen against her chin. “No,” she began slowly. “I’m not bothered by it. Is it weird knowing I’m 2 years older than you?”

“Nope!” Was the quick reply, causing Weiss’s lips to pull up in a small smile. “You’re still the same old grouch you’ve always been. Now the ‘old’ part is just a little more literal.”

Snorting at her soulmate’s strange humor, Weiss wrote back a smiley face with the tongue sticking out before wishing her partner a good night.

-

Weiss wakes up the next morning with a beautifully drawn gray wolf adorning her forearm, howling at the moon with trees and and a mountain in the background. The air is pulled from her mouth in a gasp, and she lets her fingers trail over her own forearm in awe of the artwork. Her soulmate had sure improved from drawing stick figures and tiny flowers. Written in familiar chicken scratch are the words “Happy Birthday” with a smiley face etched in at the end.

Nothing could possibly ruin her good mood, and the heiress is on cloud nine all day. She takes to writing on the back of her hand and thigh in an effort to talk with her friend, entirely unwilling to ruin the masterpiece that must’ve taken hours to finish.

-

Some time after Weiss’s eighteenth birthday, she gets in an accident. She was fencing with her brother, without their masks, when their duel got aggressive. Whitley lunged at her face and Weiss was so startled that she accidentally jerked into the thrust instead of away. A huge gash opened up on the left side of her face, and blood began to drip onto the practice matts immediately. Weiss let out a cry of pain and brought her hands to her eye, which she’d forced shut once her brother’s rapier had come into contact with her skin.

Collapsing onto the floor from the sheer pain, Weiss screamed for Whitley to go get Klein, Winter, anyone who could get her to some medical professionals. He had regarded her cooly from his position above her, wiping down his fencing sword with a rag to remove it of blood. Shooting her a sickeningly sweet smile paired with an “Of course, dear sister.” He strode out of the room at a leisurely pace, acting as if his older sister wasn’t bleeding all over their pristine marble floors.

-

Weiss was in the hospital for a few days, receiving surgery to save her eye and to make sure the gash over it would heal cleanly and not garner an infection. She didn’t have access to a pen or marker for those few days, and Weiss felt the familiar tingles on her arm grow in frequency every time a message went unanswered.

Each one grew more worried and panicked, to the point where the writing becomes almost illegible due to smudging and how scrawled the words become.

Once she’s out of the hospital and is able to get her hands on a pen, she writes a quick apology for her silence in preparation to tell the story of why she was unable to communicate. Weiss’s words are cut off with a quick “I’m so glad you’re okay” that causes her heart to clench painfully.

It is in that moment that Weiss realizes the person who constantly left beautiful little doodles on her skin was quickly becoming her best friend. She would go to them with anything and everything, and they did the same. A pen had never felt so natural in her hands. The hand cramps she sustained after particularly lengthy conversations couldn’t even deter the excitement she felt every time that familiar tingling sensation set in. She’d once even sat down and used both of her thighs to communicate with her soulmate before running out of available skin that her left hand could comfortably reach.

But she didn't love them or anything!

They were just best friends.

-

At the age of twenty-one, Weiss’s penpal admitted that they had gotten sick. “Nothing serious,” they promised, “but I won't be able to write for a bit. Don't miss me too much.”

Weeks went by with no sign of her soulmate (Weiss had started to cringe less when she heard the word, and she didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing). Weiss decided she would wait another week before writing. Because it wasn't like she was in love or anything. If she could ignore the urge to write on her skin before, she could do it again.

A week came and went, and Weiss’s arms had never been this devoid of markings since she was seven. She risked raising her long sleeve up and scrawled a quick “hello?” during one of her breaks at work and hoped for the best. Weiss nervously bounced her leg under her desk for the remainder of her work day, and was distracted up until she felt the familiar warmth of ink appearing on her skin. She exhaled in relief and pushed her right sleeve up quickly, antsy to see what her friend had been up to.

But Weiss was NOT in love. She just missed her best friend.

Excited, Weiss looked down at her forearm. She then felt as if she'd been hit by a truck.

“I'm dying.”

Two simple words that made her heart stop and her breathing begin to speed up, ragged exhales shaking Weiss’s slender frame.

“What?” Panicked chicken scratch bled into her skin as she anxiously awaited a response, tapping her pen against her desk anxiously as she awaited a response.

“I'm sorry, I didn't know how to tell you.” It was the same childlike handwriting she'd seen on her skin since she was 5. Definitely still her best friend on the other end, and not some horrible prank.

“What’s wrong? Where are you?”

“Cancer. A hospital in Vale.”

Weiss had never left work so quickly in her entire life. She shot out of the glass doors like a rocket, hand shaking as she brought the pen tip down on her wrist once more. “I'm coming,” she promised with a red ink pen she'd accidentally stolen from work “please hold on, I'm coming.”

“Don't. I'm getting treatment to try and fight it. I don't want your first memory of my face to be pale and scrunched up with pain.”

Weiss felt like crying. Her soulmate had been selfless since the very beginning. How could she deny the person on the other end of her skin anything? “Okay. Please let me know if you need anything.”

A simple “:)” was all she got in response. For the first time since she was seven, Weiss cried herself to sleep over the thought of the numbers ticking down on her wrist.

But she wasn't in love.

For the months that followed that night, the writing back and forth became inconsistent. They both tried their hardest, but they just weren't teenagers anymore. They didn't have the luxury of dropping everything to respond to one another.

Weiss _definitely_ wasn't in love with this.

-

Three months after Weiss’s twenty-third birthday, the familiar burn began again on her skin. Glancing down and stopping her typing mid-sentence, blue eyes skimmed the words on her forearm with something akin to awe.

“Beacon Memorial Cancer Center in upper Vale. Ruby Rose. Room 412.”

Panic overpowered the rest of her body and took control. Weiss was up and running towards her father’s office before she realized what she was doing. She barged in without knocking, the words “I need to go to Vale” leaving her in a rush.

Her father’s white eyebrows, dyed from a combination of aging and stress, raised in shock at his daughter’s abrupt entrance. “Weiss, are you okay?”

“Father please,” she begged, stepping into the room while wringing her hands. “I have to go. My soulmate, they’re sick.”

Just as she finished her sentence, warmth spread across her wrist once more as more letters appeared beneath the address from before.

“I understand if you can't make it, I wouldn't be upset. I just wanted to let you know.”

Weiss just barely held back her cry of anguish, turning her watery eyes back towards her dad. “ _Please_ , Father.”

Cool eyes regarded her shaking form with indifference, glancing at his computer for a few minutes before going back to whatever he was doing before. Weiss felt her heart stop, watching the man who raised her ignore her request in favor for typing away like she didn’t exist. Growing angry, Weiss opened her mouth to scream that word she kept reserved for The System and brussel sprouts before her dad’s eyes were upon her again. “You leave in seven days time. The flight will take 36 hours, and while you’re there I want you to do some work over at the company branch in Vale.”

He stood from his chair and collected papers, a printed plane ticket. from the printer below his desk, regarding Weiss’s shocked frame with indifference. “Do not disappoint me.”

Sagging with relief and pulling out the marker she always carried with her in her skirt pocket, Weiss wrote two simple sentences in reply:

“I'll be there. Wait for me.”

-

After a week of preparations and making sure she had absolutely everything necessary to fly to another country, Weiss was on her way. By the time she arrived in Vale, it was nearing four in the morning. There was no way the hospital would allow her entrance, and she was completely exhausted. The girl was running on complete fumes, having gotten little to no sleep since Ruby had last written to her.

_Ruby,_ Weiss mused as she readied herself for bed. _That’s a girl’s name. My soulmate is a woman._

Finding that the information didn’t bother her whatsoever, Weiss got into her hotel bed fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

-

Weiss awoke twenty seven hours later, sporting extreme bedhead and a confused look on her face. Glancing at her surroundings, Weiss remembered where she was. Vale! She was trying to see Ruby! Cursing under her breath, Weiss scrambled to shower and get ready, periodically checking the time. Being sleep deprived for over a week really messes you up. She’d awoken at around 7 AM and if she hurried Weiss could make it to the hospital by 9, taking traffic into account.

She flew down the stairs of her hotel, forgoing the elevator in case it stalled at too many floors or didn’t come fast enough. Weiss hailed a taxi with aggression she didn’t know she possessed, and babbled the hospital name off by memory. Fidgeting in the back seat with the marker she’d started taking everywhere with her by habit, Weiss willed the taxi to speed up and for the traffic to vanish. Arriving outside, Weiss hurriedly threw her fare and a tip at the driver before jogging up the steps and into the facility.

Breathlessly stopping in front of the receptionist’s desk, Weiss asked the man behind the desk to be let into room 412 for visitation hours. The blonde haired man, Sun his nametag read, smiled sympathetically and asked if she was related to the patient. Anxious and ready to finally see the person she'd been writing to for over sixteen years, Weiss quickly muttered the word “soulmate” before lifting her covered bracelet as proof.

Sorrow took over Sun the receptionist's face before he quickly typed something on his computer and handed Weiss a visitor’s pass. “I'm really sorry… let yourself right in.”

A breathy ‘thank you’ left the woman’s lips as she all but ran up to the nearest elevator and jabbed the number ‘four’ on the floor panel.

While waiting for the elevator to rise, she realized she’d referred to Ruby as her soulmate without a second thought. Confused with her actions and her feelings, which she still refused to call love, Weiss exited the elevator before asking for directions to the correct wing.

Weiss walked as fast as she dared without it turning into running down the crowded hallway before she arrived in front of the room labeled “412”. Inhaling deeply and letting out a stuttering breath, Weiss pushed open the door to finally reveal her soulmate.

There were people gathered around the hospital bed and murmuring soft words of comfort to whoever lay in its clutches. All noise stopped once the group of people heard someone pacing into the room. Flushed red with nerves,Weiss took a deep breath in an effort to calm herself before speaking.

“Uh, hello. I'm Weiss Schnee, and I'm Ruby’s soulmate.”

Gasps echoed around the room and the tall blonde man previously blocking the view of her soulmate quickly moved out of the way to reveal who was laying on the hospital bed. “Ruby, honey, wake up. Your soulmate is here to visit you.”

“A damn fine one, too.”

An angry chorus of “Yang!”s cut through the silence of the room, causing the tall blonde woman who’d spoken to laugh and throw her hands up in apology. “C’mon! Are you guys not seeing her? She’s beautiful!”

“Yang, shut up,” A new voice piped in, and Weiss knew instinctively that it was Ruby who had spoken. Her heart felt as nervous as a baby bird’s and fluttered as if it was going to give out. On the bed before her lay a young woman with a messy mop of dark brown hair. Shocks of red stood out against her head, and Weiss noticed that the color covered the ends of the shoulder length pieces. On the left side of her soulmate’s face sat a large mass of scar tissue, bright pink and covering the majority of her eye socket and creeping its way down her cheek and up her forehead.

As soon as Weiss’s blue eyes met Ruby’s silver, the bedridden woman shot her a toothy smile. “Huh. I always thought your handwriting was too neat to be a guy’s.”

A sudden weight on her wrist made itself known, and Weiss realized it was her bracelet unlatching. Glancing at Ruby’s wrist and seeing another shapeless mound under her own scarf, Weiss let a matching smile bloom on her face.

Forgetting anyone else was in the room, Weiss rolled her eyes fondly and responded, “Funny, your handwriting was sloppy enough for me to never even consider you being a girl.”

Happy laughter left the body in the bed and Weiss felt like she was on cloud nine. Maybe these bracelets were onto something after all. Letting her eyes drink in the sight of Ruby laying before her, Weiss startles slightly when she realizes both she and Ruby have scars on the left side of their faces. Weiss wonders if Ruby also has to put eyedrops onto the injured appendage to keep it moist, or if her eyesight is weaker in one eye over the other.

Approaching the bed and taking the seat offered by a dark haired girl with a large bow, Weiss clutched at her soulmate’s hand like a lifeline. “Wait, what am I saying, you're in a hospital! Are you okay?! You sent me the address and I thought something bad had happened to you, and I came as soon as I could, I'm so sorry about the delay…”

Ruby smiled lazily at Weiss as she rambled about how worried she’d been once her doodles and messages became less frequent. “Well, I invited everyone that I cared about here because I have some news. I didn't know if you'd come, but I had a good feeling that you'd try your hardest.” Taking some calming breaths, Ruby nodded at the people gathered in the hospital room and her newfound soulmate before whispering, “The procedures and surgeries have finally paid off. I'm cancer free.”

Turning to the right where a tearful Weiss sat trying not to cry, Ruby promised her they could continue being friends until Weiss decided what she wanted. “There’s no pressure or anything,” Ruby told her with a happy smile. “I’ve got all the time in the world now.” Watery laughter left Weiss’s lips as she kissed the back of Ruby’s hand and promised her forever. 

This was probably what love felt like.

Taking a marker out of her pocket, Weiss hid her arm and scrawled a delicate “I love you” on the inside of her wrist.

Weiss watched in fascination at the way Ruby’s eyebrows furrowed at the familiar heat spreading through her wrist. As she looked down, Ruby’s heart tripped over itself in delight and she squeaked in excitement. The heart monitor mimicked Ruby’s increase in heart rate, and everyone gathered in the room laughed good naturedly and welcomed Weiss to the family. 

Weiss had never felt so full of love and happiness in her entire life. Maybe these bracelets were onto something after all. Maybe it was love.

-

Weiss Schnee had always thought the entire process to be barbaric. She'd read of universes in fairy tales and story books where you were free to find love on your own and not have it assigned to you. Where being heartbroken was a common occurrence, and people fell in and out of love on the daily.

Little did she know, she would be able to experience many of the things her books spoke of as she grew up. Whether it was the work of the bracelet or Ruby’s natural charm, Weiss liked to think that she fell in love on her own. Their relationship wasn't perfect, and she grew heartbroken every time Ruby so much as showed any sign of lingering sickness. It may not have been the type of heartbreak her books had told her of, but that was completely fine to the pair.

From the moment you are born, you are assigned to someone. To be another’s perfect match in every sense of the word. The strength that they lack, compassion they crave, or the laughter they need in their darkest moments. From the moment you are born, a metal band is slapped onto your left wrist counting down the amount of time remaining before you meet your “soulmate.”

If you're lucky, your relationship will develop strong enough to the point where you get all three and then some. If you're lucky, you'll have the purest of love to share between you, and a story for the ages to pass down to your children. If you’re lucky, you’ll find true love in the eyes of your soulmate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here that hoe is!!! day 2 of whiterose week. :)  
> sorry for any typos or grammatical errors. i check my writing myself and i dont always catch everything.  
> as always, i hope y'all enjoyed this lil AU i cooked up. kudos, comments, bookmarks, follows, anything is appreciated!  
> my tumblr is octoputhy in case you wanna talk or yknow. not talk? idk. thanks for tuning in.


	3. Day 3: Struggle (Emotions/Past/Trauma)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello! let me say now that this story is HEAVILY based off of the short I wrote and have up on my ao3 titled "scars" so do not be startled by the similarities. i didnt steal it from anyone but myself.  
> thank you guys SO MUCH for the tremendous amount of support on the chapter for day 2, you have no idea how much it meant to me. without further adieu, DAY 3!

Ruby sat reclined comfortably against the wall of the motel room she and her partner slash girlfriend were currently occupying. Her hands were linked behind her in an effort to prop her head up and make her position more comfortable. Ruby sighed lowly, letting her eyes lazily pass over the contents of the room. She’d already spent five minutes counting and recounting every piece of furniture in the room, and another ten mentally calculating how many bullet shells she could fit in all of the drawers in the room.

(The answer was unknown, since Ruby got bored of counting after about one hundred.)

It was dark outside, maybe half past nine, and Ruby was fighting off the chains of slumber pulling against her eyelids. She and Weiss had been on a recon mission for the past three days, and she was more than ready to sleep for the next four years or so. Snickering lightly at her thought process, Ruby let her eyes drift to the window that took up a small portion of the room’s north wall. The moon shone in all of its shattered glory, managing to send enough light out that it illuminated the wilderness beyond the shody motel walls.

Crossing and uncrossing her legs for what seemed like the millionth time in an effort to stay awake, Ruby sits up when she hears a click emanating from the restroom door. Grinning at her girlfriend, the young girl begins to bounce lightly against the hard springs of the mattress. “Finally! I thought you’d fallen in the toilet or something. Can I brush my teeth now?”

Stopping her bouncing once Weiss didn’t respond with her usual snark or laughter, Ruby squinted and began to scrutinize her partner. She stood stiff and ramrod straight, with her arms entwined and holding herself as if she were cold. Her cerulean eyes darted from Ruby, the bed beneath her, and the lamp located on a nightstand with such speed that it made Ruby’s brain throb a little.

Now _that’s_ saying something. Ruby, getting a headache from looking at something fast? She’d be out of a job if she couldn’t handle some speed; it’s what she was known for!

Snapping her eyes towards her fidgeting partner, Ruby slipped into leader mode momentarily due to concern for her partner. “Weiss, what’s wrong? Didja see a bug in there or something?”

“Oh please,” Weiss scoffs back, immediately. “As if some lowly insect could make me nervous.”

Ruby chuckled lightly at Weiss so clearly falling for her bait, nodding along with her words empathetically. If Weiss was able to get so prickly over a creepy crawly, then there wasn’t anything seriously wrong with her.

“Okay, so you don’t mind if I go brush my teeth, then?”

“Wait!”

Stopping halfway straddled over the edge of the bed, Ruby looks up at Weiss in confusion. Huh, maybe Weiss really needed to talk about something. Did she mislabel some of her files for their mission? Or did she accidentally leave her mud covered boots in the middle of the room again? Unable to think of anything she could have done to bother Weiss, Ruby settles back onto the bed with crossed legs. She decides to stay silent, figuring that her girlfriend will decide to speak up once she’s ready.

“So, Ruby…” Weiss starts slowly, a nervous edge creeping into her voice.

“So, Weiss,” Ruby parrots back, winning a small smile from Weiss at her efforts. “It’s just me. No need to be so nervous.”

Snowy hair bobs in response as Weiss nods, psyching herself up for whatever she has to tell Ruby. “We’ve been dating for a while now.”

“Five months!”

“Five months. I was wondering if you were, perhaps, ready to take our relationship to the next step?”

Spluttering, Ruby uncrosses her legs and shoots onto her feet. “W-woah, wait! Weiss are you sure? I know this would be both of our first times, and you always said you wanted it to be special...”

“Every second I get to spend with you I hold near and dear to my heart,” Weiss tells her with a soft smile, causing Ruby’s cheeks to heat up slightly at the mushy words. “I think I was just scared.”

“Wha? Scared of _me_?”

“Well, yes. But not only that. I was afraid that I would somehow ruin what we have with my incompetence, or you would decide that you didn’t want damaged goods after all.”

Weiss stops then, left breathless by her own words. She bites her lip and avoids eye contact with Ruby, bracing for the inevitable questioning. Ruby shuts her dropped jaw with a loud ‘clack’ and ponders her options. She could admonish Weiss for her negative thinking or she could appease her worries without addressing the obvious issues she has with herself. Deciding to try and do both at once, Ruby crawls back onto their bed and settles down on her knees.

Making sure to keep eye contact with Weiss, Ruby reaches down and begins to lift the hem of her shirt. A choked gasp reaches her ears, but she is left blind when she struggles to fit her head and arms through their respective holes. Growing clumsy due to her nerves, Ruby is left a tangled mess on the bed. She huffs, embarrassed, before letting out a pitiful whine. 

“Weiiiiiisssssssss, I’m stuck.”

Soft laughter is the only response she receives for a few seconds, causing her to huff unhappily. If her arms weren’t trapped by this unnecessarily strong fabric, she’d totally cross them right about now.

“Here, honey, let me help you.”

Cool hands rearrange her limbs with a gentle touch, making sure as to not accidentally harm Ruby. Once her arms are free, Weiss directs them towards Ruby’s side as to not get them lost in the shirt once more. She gives a soft tug of the cloth settled around Ruby’s head, freeing the bottom half of her face. Ruby feels a quick press of lips against her own before she is freed entirely, greeted by a smiling Weiss.

“I was sabotaged,” Ruby says with a pout. “My own shirt betrayed me.” She goes to remove her bottoms then, throwing them onto the floor where Weiss dropped Ruby’s rogue top. Glancing back up at Weiss, Ruby quickly looks her up and down. “Okay, I know we’re both virgins but I’m pretty sure the clothes have to come off for this to work properly.”

“I know how it works! Just. Give me a few minutes.”

-

Ruby has been sitting on the bed for 10 minutes stripped down to her bra and panties while Weiss is still in her clothes from earlier. She thought that maybe if she undressed first, Weiss would feel better about their first time and see that Ruby was entirely willing to take this next step with her. She didn’t want to pressure her, so she’d begun counting furniture again to distract her mind.

As Ruby lets her eyes wander over to Weiss once more, and who can blame her when her girlfriend is so devastatingly beautiful, she sees the girl’s shoulders begin to shake. Ruby is off the bed and walking towards her in a heartbeat. She begins rubbing her arms up and down Weiss’s biceps in what she hopes is a soothing manner. The heiress’s breathing is coming out slightly quicker than normal and Ruby can see the whites of her eyes. She trembles every few seconds, as if she is fighting against her own instincts to flee from the situation.

“Weiss,” she begins softly, “we don’t have to do this if you aren’t ready-“

Weiss is already shaking her head before Ruby can finish “No. I’m fine. Just... please don’t judge me too harshly when you see.” 

Ruby tilts her head in acknowledgement of the request and moves back a few paces as Weiss finally begins to undress. Ever the prim and proper heiress she was brought up to be, she bends to pick up her clothes and place them on the back of the chair by the desk in their room, folding them as she goes. Ruby spends this time to admire Weiss’s alabaster skin in the moonlight, letting her eyes rove hungrily over the newly exposed skin before her.

Not too long after Weiss successfully deposits the dirty clothes over the back of a chair does she notice, silver eyes zeroing in on her back. It is riddled with scars and bumps, starting at her shoulders and dipping into the grooves on her lower back. They vary in color and size, some seeming to be burn marks and others uncomfortable looking cuts that never healed properly. Ruby feels the air leave her in a rush and she sees Weiss tense up at the sound. Her shaking begins anew, albeit more extreme than before. Ruby approaches slowly and looks down at her partner’s unstable frame.

“Oh Weiss...” she starts, bringing her hands up hesitantly. She lets her hands hover there in the space between them, close enough that she can feel the heat emanating from Weiss’s skin. “Can I?”

“It’s ‘may I’, dolt,” Weiss snaps in response, uncomfortable. “But yes.”

Ruby rolls her eyes at her girlfriend’s snark before laying her hands softly on Weiss’s upper back. She rubs soothing circles into the tense muscles for a few minutes as she waits for the shaking to lighten up. She feels the muscles jump and tighten at her gentle ministrations, reminding Ruby of the way injured animals shy away from unfamiliar hands. Brushing Weiss’s long mane of hair over her shoulder to have easier access to her back, Ruby gently thumbs over a large scar in awe. Once Ruby is confident that Weiss has become used to her touch, she lets her head fall forward to place a kiss upon the first mark she sees. Weiss immediately stands straighter and lets out a gasp in response.

Pausing at the sound, fearing she has overstepped boundaries she didn’t know existed, Ruby begins to pull back. Before apologies can spill from her lips, Weiss lets out a quiet ‘wait’ that halts Ruby’s retreat. She watches as Weiss’s shoulders rise and fall with a heavy breath before they tighten again. Seeing her girlfriend’s long ponytail sway to the side with Weiss’s nod in a sign of consent, Ruby leans forward to continue where she’d left off.

Ruby maneuvers her mouth across the span of marred skin at her disposal. Her kisses grow more confident and sweet as she continues, but when she first hears a sniffle leave Weiss’s nose, she stops. She takes Weiss by the shoulders and turns her around so she can see her face. The girl’s eyes are glassy and her lower lip is quivering, causing Ruby’s heart to break at the look of pure sorrow adorning her partner’s face. Ruby slowly lowers her head and pauses before she reaches Weiss’s lips, giving her the chance to move away.

Silver eyes widen slightly at the wild look on Weiss’s face as she surges upwards to meet her and feels their noses bump clumsily. The kiss is messy and slightly wet from the tears falling down Weiss’s face, but Ruby wouldn’t have it any other way. Tilting her head slightly to better the angle and deepen the kiss, Ruby feels a rough exhale from Weiss’s nose in response. Backing away to breathe, Ruby peppers tiny kisses onto Weiss’s cheeks as an apology for her lack of lung strength. After a few seconds, Ruby moves higher to place a kiss over Weiss’s scarred eye and a tiny whimper claws its way up from the girl’s throat in response.

“I’m sorry he did this to you, Weiss. But know that no one will ever hurt you again for as long as I’ll live.” She takes her girlfriend’s chin between her index finger and thumb, making sure their eyes are locked onto each other for her next words. “You are _not_ damaged goods, no matter what anyone says. I love you, okay?”

Weiss hesitates slightly, peering up at Ruby through the fringe of her bangs. “Scars and all?”

Fighting back tears at the heartbroken tone, Ruby presses her lips against Weiss’s forehead and shuts her eyes. “Scars and all,” she murmurs against her skin, sinking into the lithe arms winding themselves around her waist.

The two stay in that embrace for a while, breathing in the scent of each other and taking comfort in the combined sensation of their auras mingling. Feeling Weiss yawn against her neck, Ruby steps back. Chuckling at the tiny whine that escapes her girlfriend, Ruby takes Weiss by the hand and leads her to bed. The duo clambers in together, fluffing up pillows and freeing blankets from their confined folded positions. Once Ruby settles down, she feels a sudden weight on her abdomen that causes her to grunt.

“Weiss, what are you doing?”

“You, hopefully.”

A choked gasp crosses Ruby’s lips before Weiss is leaning down to steal it, smiling against the warmth of her partner’s mouth. She feels breathy laughter against her face as Weiss mimics her motions from earlier, placing tiny kisses all over her face as she struggles to comprehend what’s happening. Stopping her kisses against Ruby’s jawline, she feels more than hears Weiss whisper “or do you still need to brush your teeth?”

Ruby most definitely prefers this over counting furniture.


	4. Day 4: Snuggles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly y'all this one was super hard for me to write, which is why it's so short. sorry to do y'all like that. i'll try to make up for it with tomorrow's prompt. if anyone's interested i drew some fanart and it's what inspired me to write this fic. i'll add the link in case anyone out there is interested. happy wr week.
> 
> http:// octoputhy .tumblr .com /post/174843902976/junk-of-the-heart-chapter-4-beyoncesthighgap

An alarm sounds, ripping through the calm silence of the early morning. Twin groans of annoyance break through the sleeping bodies on the bed. Weiss scowls darkly, wishing away the horrible sound that dared to ruin her rest. After a few more minutes of the repetitive ringing sound Weiss sits up with a grumble and reaches for her scroll, disengaging the alarm and throwing the spacious room into silence once more. A happy sigh leaves the body still in bed, and Weiss lets a smile slip onto her face at the sound. Throwing her legs over the side of the queen sized mattress, Weiss feels warm hands grip at her arm.

“Where’re you going?” Ruby mumbles sleepily, face still smushed against her pillow. “S’too early for anythin’.”

“I have to go take care of some things for work, babe.”

“Mmh, nope.”

Weiss raised an eyebrow, letting her lips quirk up into a smile. “Nope?”

“Nope,” Ruby reiterates, letting the word end with a little pop sound as she rolls over, squinting at the sudden light assaulting her eyes. “No working today.”

“And why not?”

“S’our anniversary.”

Weiss bursts out laughing at that, shaking her head at her girlfriend’s antics. “No it isn’t.”

“My birthday.”

“Wrong again, honey.”

“Your birthday?”

“No birthdays or anniversaries here. Just working.”

Ruby grumbles, dragging herself across the bed to lay her head on Weiss’s thighs. She burrows into her lap like a puppy, letting out a huff of satisfaction once she’s grown comfortable. Weiss runs her hands through Ruby’s hair fondly, marvelling at how much her bed-head resembles a Nevermore’s nest. She lets her eyes roam across her girlfriend’s lean build, marveling at the way the light glints off of her bare skin.

Hit with a sudden longing to return to the warm embrace of Ruby and their shared bed, Weiss reaches for her scroll once again. Ruby whines a little at being jostled, but she settles down once Weiss begins scratching her scalp soothingly. Raising her scroll to her ear and balancing it between her cheek and shoulder, Weiss waits for the telltale voice of her sister to reach her ears.

“Hello, Weiss. Good morning.”

“Good morning, Winter,” Weiss replies kindly, reaching up to adjust her phone. “I’m sorry to call in at such a late notice, but Ruby isn’t feeling too well. I was wondering if I could have the day off to care for her?” A huff of laughter reaches Weiss’s ears then, causing her to furrow her brow slightly in confusion. “Is something the matter?”

“I just find it humorous that your ill girlfriend was able to find the strength to give me a call last night to tell me that _you_ were feeling under the weather, is all.”

Weiss groans, embarrassed. That’s why Ruby had been so insistent on Weiss staying behind! She’d already called and gotten Weiss a day out of work. She reaches up to free her phone from the place between her cheek and shoulder, switching it to her right ear so that her arm wouldn’t be twisted at an odd angle. Tugging lightly on Ruby’s hair with her left hand to admonish her, Weiss turns her attention back to her call with Winter with a nervous chuckle. “I’m sorry that she did that, I’ll come into work immediately.”

“It’s fine,” her sister tells her flippantly. Weiss can almost picture the exasperated look on her face, and she has to fight back a laugh.”You have been working rather hard, I suppose you deserve this day off. Just don’t make a habit of it.”

“Understood. Thank you so much, Winter.”

“You’re welcome, Weiss. Have a nice day.”

The ‘click’ that signals an ended call lets Weiss know that Winter has hung up, and she tosses her scroll onto the bedside table. She looks down at Ruby for the first time since the call began and is met with drowsy silver eyes peering up at her. A cheeky smile is thrown her way and Weiss huffs, nudging Ruby to the side and off her thighs.

Understanding the unsaid signal, Ruby scoots back into her side of the bed and opens her arms for Weiss to crawl back into. Shuffling into position with her back against Ruby’s front, Weiss feels Ruby exhale against her neck as she nuzzles closer.

“Hi.”

“Hello, dolt.”

“I’m sorry for calling in sick for you without asking,” Ruby mumbles apologetically, placing a kiss against the nape of Weiss’s neck. “I thought you deserved the opportunity to sleep in some more and relax; you’ve been super stressed lately.”

Weiss hums softly, letting Ruby fidget behind her nervously due to her silence. She feels her partner nudge her nose against her cheek, trying to get her head to turn. When she is unsuccessful she pouts cutely and tightens her hold against Weiss’s abdomen, vying for her partner’s attention.

Sighing loudly for dramatics, Weiss turns her head and places her mouth against Ruby’s softly in acceptance of her apology. When she pulls back she makes sure to give the mischievous girl a stern ‘don’t do that again’ glare. Her girlfriend grins sheepishly and hides behind the curtain of white hair before her, snuggling into Weiss’s back.

“Can we go back to sleep and cuddle? It is your day off, after all.”

“Well it’s the least I can do after you went through all that trouble, isn’t it?” Weiss asks, laughing when Ruby nods fervently from her place behind her. “Good night, Ruby.”

“Babe it’s morning.”

“Don’t ruin this for yourself.”

“Good night, Weiss.”

Relaxing into her girlfriend’s hold, Weiss takes the time to appreciate the lithe arms around her. They are the only place she feels truly safe and cared for, like nothing can hurt her as long as Ruby is holding her close to her chest and playing with her hair.

Once, in the dead of night, Ruby had propped herself up her elbows to whisper to Weiss that when she was bored and the other girl was asleep, she’d lay her head by the end of Weiss’s long hair and pretend that she had a white mustache or a beard. Weiss remembers that she had laughed and rolled on top of Ruby, tickling her girlfriend before leaning down to steal a kiss from her breathless form.

Startling out of Ruby’s embrace, Weiss turns to her girlfriend and shakes her shoulder. “Hun, I forgot to tell you something super important.”

Watching as silver eyes force themselves open once more, Weiss turns and kisses her girlfriend sweetly, drawing out a happy sigh from her lips. Pulling back, she watches as Ruby licks her lips appreciatively and smiles goofily up at her. “Yes, babe?”

“I love you.”

Ruby’s silly grin spreads so wide that her eyes scrunch up and her tongue pokes out between her teeth, tempting Weiss to lean down and claim it. Acting on her desires, Weiss draws Ruby into another, deeper kiss. Laying down to face Ruby, she watches as silver eyes rove lazily over her face as if to memorize it. Once blue and silver lock, Ruby whispers a hoarse, “I love you so much,” in return.

Scooting forward so that her head is hiding under Ruby’s chin, Weiss curls into a ball and relishes in the feeling of Ruby’s arms around her. As their room settles once more into a sleepy silence, Weiss whispers everything she’s wanted since she first fell for the messy brunette.

“Marry me.”

Weiss feels Ruby’s chest expand and stutter as it struggles to exhale. The shaky breath brushes the hairs at the top of Weiss’s head as she lays there, contentedly awaiting Ruby’s response. She is drawn into a tight hug and the ex-heiress knows she has her answer.

“Only if you marry me first.”

A laugh erupts from her throat, and Weiss thanks every deity she can think of for blessing her cold life with Ruby’s warmth. “I guess it is kind of our anniversary now, huh?”

She feels Ruby press a smile against her forehead as she runs her hands up and down Weiss’s bare back lazily, as if she is soaking in the moment. “Yeah, I guess it is.”


	5. Day 5: Mythological/Fantasy AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**WARNING FOR THOSE WHO ARE UNCOMFORTABLE WITH GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF VIOLENCE, BLOOD, OR GORE. IF YOU ARE AGAINST ANY OF THESE THINGS, PLEASE BE WARNED THAT THEY PLAY A MAJOR PART IN THIS CHAPTER. CHARACTER DEATH IS ALSO PRESENT._
> 
>  
> 
> oof hello again friends. this is the day i was ABSOLUTELY the most excited to write for. HUGE shout out to raiyu and caflappy on tumblr for being so extremely supportive of my stuff. and OF COURSE to those of y'all who have read and commented every day. you make writing worth every hour that i put into this stuff. thank you so so so much for the support and kindness. enjoy!  
> \- also anyone who catches the references thrown into the chapter can be my friend forever

Ruby pants for air as she surveys her surroundings, holding a pistol firmly in her left hand and covering the bottom half of her face with her right. The air is thick with the aroma of sickness and death, and although it’s been months, Ruby still isn’t used to the way the scent makes her stomach churn unhappily.

Squelching sounds echo through the warehouse as she circles the Turned before her, nudging motionless hunks of flesh as she continues her way back to where she’d last seen Weiss. Her boots crunch disgustingly against decaying skin and bones as she walks, causing Ruby to scrunch up her nose unhappily beneath her hand. Satisfied with her check of the undead being actually dead this time, Ruby holsters her gun in the butt of her jeans and quickly makes her way to the back of the building before an ear piercing shriek makes itself known.

Ice crawls through Ruby’s veins as she kicks herself into high gear, rushing towards the anguished scream. Skidding around a corner and catching herself against the adjacent wall, uncovering her face in the process, Ruby is met with the sight of Weiss Schnee, her partner in crime and the zombie apocalypse (and also the love of her life) being mauled by a zombie with her trusty hunting knife nowhere in sight.

Fear sets the girl’s senses on high alert, causing her to unholster her pistol and turn the safety off with a soft and decisive click. Panicked blue and silver eyes meet, Weiss’s heaving breaths and weak pushes at the undead doing nothing to curb it of its hunger for flesh. Ruby lets loose a round of shots that rattle her bones and echo throughout the empty hallway, cutting through the light sobbing that could be coming from either girl. Dark locks fly wildly as Ruby shoves away the freshly re-killed corpse from her partner’s side, pushing shaky hands against a gushing wound.

The right side of Weiss’s abdomen has been torn to shreds, crimson blood flowing steadily from the multiple bites that were inflicted before Ruby arrived. The heiress’s normally pristine skin has now been marred by jagged teeth marks and is a mess of clumsily ripped away flesh, leaving a gaping hole where wiry muscle used to once reside. The skin around the wound has already begun to blacken and die, showing that the infection has quickly begun to take hold.

“You’re going to be okay, Weiss,” Ruby lies around a film of tears. “You’re going to be okay.”

Through the pain, sweaty brows find the energy to furrow and eyes cloudy with tears join by rolling in a perfect picture of unneeded attitude. “Don’t be such a dimwit, Ruby. There’s no way I’ll recover from this.”

Fire spreads through Weiss’s body and she hisses when Ruby presses against the wound more firmly, hoping to stem the bleeding. Sniffling, the brunette hangs her head and speaks her next words with such softness that they seem almost like a prayer.

“Please don’t leave me, Weiss. You’re all I have left.”

Alabaster hands that look gray from blood-loss raise shakily, brushing overgrown bangs out of the way to reveal silver eyes rimmed with tear-induced redness. Weiss feel’s her heart throb painfully, and she doesn’t know if it’s from the virus or how devastatingly beautiful Ruby looks.

“You dolt,” she chokes out around a shaky smile, “I’ll never leave you. Partners forever, remember?”

Although neither say it out loud, they know it’s for naught. They’ve lost enough friends and family to the virus to know how quickly it can take over its host’s body and mind.

-

Blake lost a battle of wills that would have toppled even the mightiest of warriors. The infection came slowly for her; forcing her to steadily lose her mind along with her self control. The hallucinations came first, causing the golden eyed girl to fall into hysterics multiple times throughout the three days that she suffered. She would point and scream at nothing, drawing packs of Turned towards her shrill cries. Ruby had resorted to gagging Blake as they ran between buildings, with Yang being in charge of tugging her girlfriend along behind her.

Next came the fever, a blistering force that no amount of water or medicine could halt in its tracks. Yang and Ruby laid awake for hours that night, taking turns drawing a cool rag against Blake’s sweaty forehead. The normally stoic girl wept openly from the strength of her heat induced aching, the slow spread of the infection shutting Blake’s organs down one by one at a snail’s pace, which caused the sisters to shed a few in response to seeing their friend in such pain. The dark girl became dehydrated easily and her delirium was making it no easier on any of them. Day two of Blake’s sickness was by far the worst.

Day three came with hope limping behind it. Hope that Blake was somehow fighting back the disease that threatened to take hold of her; hope that she was coming back to her senses, coming back to _them_. She had started to crack a few smiles, and she was able to hold down solid food for the first time since she’d been bitten. Day three also came with betrayal.

Blake turned in the dead of night, forcing Weiss and Ruby to hold Yang back as she screamed, begging and crying for Blake to return. The only response she got was a snap of dangerous teeth and the stench of death, filling up everyone’s nostrils and making them gag at the sheer intensity of it. Weiss was the one who had to step forward and kill the beast, tears running down her face as she swiftly brought down her blade.

-

Ruby vividly remembers the sheer anguish she felt when she had watched one of the Turned rip off Yang’s right forearm in one rough yank of teeth. Blood had spurted messily out of the gaping wound, and her sister had howled in agony for what felt like hours as they’d made their hasty retreat. After their small band of misfits had lost Blake, Yang’s senses had dulled along with her vibrancy. She neglected not only herself, but her duties to the team. She was heartbroken and more depressed than she’d been when the entire Outbreak had started. She moped around during her patrol time and put the trio at risk with her negligence more times than either Weiss or Ruby could count.

Weiss tried her hardest to comfort Yang and be there for her, but the sorrow was too great. Of course, Yang never fully gave in to her sadness. She kept on fighting and plastered a smile onto her face each morning. Maybe if she had been travelling with anyone else besides her sister and best friend, her facade would have been believable.

The red and white duo had argued about what to do with Yang for so long that Ruby’s throat was aching the next day. It could have been from the force of her cries once they were finally forced to shoot Yang- no, not Yang. Whatever they had shot wasn’t human. It was a creature of the night that cared for nothing but itself and the hunger that drove it. Yang had lost herself long ago; all that remained of her was an empty shell.

At least, that’s what Weiss and Ruby whispered to each other in the dead of night, when their past sins seeped out of the shadows and circled like hungry wolves. Their mistakes loomed over them like heavy rain clouds, thick and nearly black from the sheer amount that weighed them down. It was only a matter of time before they broke.

-

Seconds turn into minutes, then hours.

-

Getting on without half of their team was difficult, but not impossible. They cut through the remaining houses in their latest city with ease, leaving the memories of their fallen friends behind them. As days bled into weeks and weeks into months, they grew used to the dull ache that would flare up whenever they saw a motorcycle abandoned in the streets or a tattered book in a house they were raiding. The duo had to just keep moving forward.

They traversed quickly throughout the wilderness, time and lack of supplies making it difficult for them to map out which state they were in at any given time. To Ruby, it felt like they’d been travelling for years. And for all she knew, they might as well have. Fireside talks lead to Weiss quietly admitting that sometimes she forgot about the world that used to exist, the world from before the Outbreak. Ruby had confirmed in a voice just as timid that sometimes she questioned if it was even real, if the only true part of their lives had been the chaos of the last handful of years.

Weiss and Ruby took care of each other, making sure they both ate and got at least six hours of sleep, even if they were scattered throughout the night. Sometimes, when the sorrow became too much, the girlfriends found themselves in each other’s arms. It was the only place that still felt truly safe in their mess of a world, and they were going to take advantage of that.

When their fears plagued their every thought, making surviving almost unbearable, Weiss and Ruby turned towards each other to act as anchors. They would lose themselves in each other, using touch and taste alone to ground their senses. Sinking into each other at the end of the night reminded each other that yeah, the world might be shit, but they still had each other. They still had someone that they wanted to protect, one good thing left in a world where good things were snatched away from you.

-

Ruby has no idea how long she’s been sitting at Weiss’s side, trying to make the girl as comfortable as she possibly can in her last few hours as herself. She has the heiress slumped against a wall for support, and has bandaged the Turned bites to the best of her ability. Ruby’s packback is acting as a makeshift pillow, keeping Weiss’s head from touching the rough brick behind her. The bleeding has slowed from an aggressive wave to a lazy river, and the gauze wrapped taut around Weiss’s abdomen is almost fully soaked with blood.

Ruby can tell Weiss is nearing her final minutes but is trying to keep a brave face on, not wanting to make her girlfriend feel guilty at her inability to save her. Blue eyes have gone cloudy due to the virus’s influence and her skin has lost nearly all of its color. Rattling breaths shake Weiss’s ribs so intensely Ruby is afraid the older girl may just fall apart before the infection can take hold.

Weakly, Weiss calls out a soft “Ruby,” to gain the other girl’s attention, and silver eyes dart over their companion worriedly.

“Y-yes, Weiss?”

”I wanted to tell you this in a much better situation, but it seems like I no longer have the time.” Snow white locks sway as Weiss tilts her head, just enough blood rushing to her cheeks to show that she is blushing. “I just needed to tell you that... I l-love you.”

Ruby lets out a hiccuping sob at that, replying with a shaky “I love you, too” that has Weiss closing her eyes with a serene smile.

“...can I ask for a favor?” Blue eyes crack open with a weakly raised brow, signaling that Ruby can continue speaking. “One last kiss?”

Weiss sits up quickly, groaning as she accidentally aggravates her bleeding side and causing the pain to flare up again. “You dolt, are you insane?! The virus is transmitted through saliva!”

Ruby gently pushes her angry partner back into position, shooting her a nervous smile. “We don’t know that for sure. Worst case scenario, I join you in the land of the undead. Best case scenario, I’m fine and I get to kiss you one last time.”

Weiss opens her mouth to argue once more, before a wave of vertigo hits her and she has to settle down to combat the stars dancing across her vision. Her muddled mind goes through the pros and cons, deciding against heeding Ruby’s reckless request. Although clearly her heart doesn’t get the memo, because she is sighing out “of course” before she even realizes what has happened. Ruby grins, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

How can she be happy at a time like this?

She leans forward and whispers another “I love you” against Weiss’s lips before pressing them together for the last time. She feels more than hears Weiss’s heavy exhale before she kisses her back, a soft and innocent push of lips. Weiss can slowly feel her consciousness slipping and mumbles an “I love you, too” before her world fades to black.

Ruby holds Weiss’s body close, figuring she has a few minutes of warmth left in her. She sobs openly onto her chest, clutching the fabric close and inhaling deeply. Picking out the scent of Weiss’s skin over the scent of blood and sickness is difficult, but not impossible. Ruby leans forward and rests her head against Weiss’s, watching in morbid fascination as the blood stops circulating and leaves her alabaster skin dull and lifeless. Smiling sadly, with tears streaming down her face, Ruby picks up her pistol from where she’d dropped it on the floor. She takes aim, hand steady even though her body is wracked with grief and fear, causing the rest of her body to shake almost violently.

“I’ll always love you.”

Two shots echo throughout the hallway, leaving the area deathly quiet.

Her suffering was over.


	6. Day 6: Pregnancy/Kids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys!!! sorry this is like, 16 hours later than i usually update this. i struggled a lot with the direction i wanted this story to go in, but i finally found it and was able to whip something up. i really enjoyed this day and i wish i could have been able to write more for it, but alas. this is what we've got. this chapter is ONCE AGAIN dedicated to raiyu because i did them dirty with the last chapter. we're almost done with wr week, guys! hang in there!  
> as always, thank you so much for going on this journey with me. the support means everything to wittle old me. happy day 6!

A loud “whoop!” sounded from the lean body of Weiss’s girlfriend, Ruby, as their home economics teacher announced their monthly class project. She practically sprinted up to the desk, bumping into countless bodies as she went. She returned to their shared table bouncing up and down before presenting her item to Weiss with a proud “ta-da!”

“Flour babies?” Weiss asked, her nose crinkled in disgust. “We have to pair up and lug around a sack of white powder all day?”

Ruby gasped loudly, covering the top portion of their assigned bag of flour as if to shield its ears. “Weiss! Not in front of the baby!”

Against her better judgement, Weiss cracked a smile at her girlfriend’s antics. She had already begun to remove her signature red hoodie in order to fashion a makeshift swaddle for their new child, babbling excitedly as she folded.

“Can I pretty please name our child, Weiss? I have the perfect idea!”

“If you say Zwei Jr. I’m breaking up with you.”

“Zwei Jun- hey! C’mon Weiss, that’s a great name!”

A loud sigh slipped past the senior’s lips as she extended her arms out towards Ruby. The junior pouted and passed the flour sack over with all of the care that you would use to handle a real child. Looking down her nose at the weighty bag in her arms, Weiss began to let her eyes roam over it. Each bag that had been passed out to every seat partner had a yellow smiley face taped on to them, giving the bags some semblance of an identity. Besides that, and the fact that Weiss and Ruby’s ‘baby’ was swaddled in red, they were just regular flour sacks.

Weiss scoffed loudly, setting the bag into the crook of her arm and beginning to rock it gently on instinct. “This project is so stupid.” Letting her eyes dance over to her girlfriend, Weiss startled at the sappy grin Ruby was sporting. “What?”

“You’re going to make a great mother one day.”

A soft heat spread over Weiss’s cheeks and ears, wiping the scowl off her face and replacing it with a small smile. “You think so?”

“I know so! Weiss Junior is gonna have the best mommies ever!” Ruby cheered, fist pumping enthusiastically.

“We are _not_ calling our daughter that,” Weiss admonished, although she was laughing slightly. “What about Blume?”

Ruby tilted her head cutely as Weiss slipped into her German accent, running through the small vocabulary she had accumulated in her year and three months dating Weiss. “Does that mean, uh, bloom?”

Keeping mindful of the ‘baby’ in her arms and the fact that they were in class, Weiss leaned forward to drop a quick kiss to Ruby’s forehead. “Close, honey, but no. It means ‘rose.’”

“But then wouldn’t her name be Rose Rose?”

“What makes you think we’re taking your last name?”

Laughing at the incredulous look on Weiss’s face, Ruby let out a teasing “we?” and watched her girlfriend’s alabaster skin tinge pink once more. For someone who thought the project was stupid, she sure seemed interested.

“Yes, we! Why do Blume and I have to be Rose, when you and her could be Schnees?”

“Uh, because you hate your family?”

A few seconds of silence passed, with Ruby looking triumphant and Weiss looking thoughtful. Finally, the duo made eye contact and were struck with twin bolts of inspiration. “Hyphenation!”

Nodding to herself, Ruby mumbled “Blume Summer Schnee-Rose?” hopefully, giving her girlfriend the best puppy dog eyes she could muster.

Hearing the name of Ruby’s deceased mother, Weiss’s competitive spark fizzled and then died. Paired with hearing their names hyphenated as if the two were married, Weiss caved and hummed her agreement.

“Blume Summer Schnee-Rose.”

Finally directing their attention towards Ms. Goodwitch, the duo began paying attention to their assignment once more. Each ‘baby’ had some kind of alarm inside of them, and it would go off every few hours to stimulate the need for food, sleep, attention, or a diaper change. There were also motion detectors, and when the assignment was done, results could be printed out to show how the bag of flour was handled. Partners were allowed to switch off ownership of the ‘child’ once a day so that each parent could have two nights with their new child. Babies were to be turned in at the end of the week, and every one that came back in perfect condition won their parents an A. The baby that came back in the best condition and the best parenting results, however, won the aforementioned parents a free dinner.

Determined, Weiss turned to Ruby with a manic glint in her eye. Startled by the sudden change in character, Ruby shied away from her now fired-up girlfriend. Weiss was scary when she got competitive.

“Babe, we’re going to win that dinner and be the best fucking parents Beacon High has ever seen.”

-

After class, Weiss promptly called her own parents and asked for permission to stay at Ruby’s house for the rest of the week. They seemed reluctant at first, but once she explained that it was for a project and that the best one got a prize, they were all for it. Schnees were notoriously competitive, and the thought of their middle daughter not being the best was more appalling than the idea that she would be with her girlfriend for five days.

Ruby texted Yang to give her a heads up and then called their dad to clear it with him. Tai Yang was more than fine with Weiss staying over and excitedly responded that he would begin making dinner. Yang responded with a barfing emoji followed by a yellow heart before saying she’d go hang out with Blake for a while.

“We’re good to go!” Ruby told Weiss excitedly as they walked to Weiss’s car at the end of the day. “Yang might be gone for a while, though. She wanted to hang out with Blake.”

“Those two can’t be apart for more than an hour without having a heart attack,” Weiss grumbled good naturedly as she placed her backpack in the trunk of her car. Holding out her hand for Ruby’s, she is rewarded with a kiss as she tosses the bag on top of her own. Ruby had been carrying Blume around in her arms all day, proudly introducing her daughter to all of her friends.

-

Jaune and Ren’s eyes had both lit up at the memories of their own flour babies, while Pyrrha’s smile had a painful twinge. “When we did that assignment,” the red head explained, “Yang was my partner. She dropped our flour bag when she drove her motorcycle home from school the first day and we got an F.”

Their lunch table had burst out laughing at that, especially when Pyrrha had turned to glare at Yang good naturedly. The tall blonde hid behind Blake, who recounted her flour baby story with a hint of a smile. “Ren and I were great parents. We were the ones who won the dinner that semester.”

Ren nodded solemnly, eyes shining as he inclined his head towards his girlfriend. “Nora was not happy that week.”

“JAUNE AND I DESERVED THAT WIN!” The fiery redhead had shouted, slamming her hands against the lunch table. It wobbled dangerously in response to her sheer strength, but everyone was used to the boisterous girl’s antics. “Baby Jora was perfectly fine when we handed her in.”

“I’m pretty sure your baby monitor showed that you two had dropped the sack of flour eight times,” Pyrrha had cut in with a sweet smile. After that, all hell broke loose, and their table descended into happy chaos once more.

-

Weiss and Ruby had dinner with the Rose-Xiao Long clan before retiring to bed, crawling into their usual positions with an added member. Weiss scoot back into Ruby’s waiting arms and dragged Blume with her, turning the cozy position into a three person spooning. They took turns waking up with the baby’s cries, usually leaving the room so that whoever was still in bed could get more rest. Ruby was sort of surprised with how seriously Weiss was taking the project since she had originally ridiculed it.

Once, Ruby woke up in response to her daughter’s cries, and when she sat up to reach for Blume, she saw that Weiss was already up and rocking her, cooing sweetly. She started to sing soft German lullabies to the bag while rocking it slowly back and forth, pacing steadily around Ruby’s messy room. The cries quieted almost immediately, and Ruby was convinced the monitor could somehow hear Weiss’s calming song. She continued singing anyways, with the moon illuminating her and casting strange shadows across Ruby’s walls. If she squinted, one of the shadows looked like Weiss was carrying a real baby, _their_ real baby.

Tears started pricking at her eyes and she started blinking rapidly, not wanting to rub her eyes and miss even a second of the vision before her. At the sound of sniffling, Weiss cut off her song and turned to face Ruby, a bemused smile on her face. “Honey, why are you crying?”

“You’re so beautiful,” Ruby whispered, letting awe slip into her tone. “I love you so much, Weiss. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”

A huge smiled started to bloom on Weiss’s face, with matching tears forming in her own eyes. She returned to Ruby’s bed in four swift strides, before pulling Ruby in for a bruising kiss while still being mindful of the ‘baby’ in her arms. “I’m never leaving you, you dolt. We’re going to be together forever.” 

-

By the third day, both ‘parents’ were exhausted and had started to doze off during some of their easier classes. Luckily for them all of the Beacon High School teachers were aware of the ongoing project, so most highly ranked students were allowed a nap or two throughout their classes. Weiss had arrived to lunch on more than one occasion to find Ruby snoozing in her usual spot, and Weiss hadn’t the heart to awaken her.

Ruby had also crept into the library a few times looking for Weiss and found the older girl napping behind bookshelves. She’d started to lend Weiss her hoodie to keep warm during her naps, and by Thursday Weiss was wearing it to school as a part of her outfit instead of Ruby. The odd color choice had garnered some confused looks, but Weiss was too content with her life and her baby to care much.

She and Ruby were going to make amazing mothers.

-

When Friday finally rolled around, Ruby and Weiss were exhausted but hopeful. They’d doted on Blume constantly and responded to every one of her cries in under a minute. Ruby had even doodled a mess of hair onto their baby’s head, white with streaks of red, because she felt bad for ‘her poor naked head’. 

The couple approached Ms. Goodwitch’s desk hesitantly, both dropping quick kisses onto their child’s head before gingerly handing her over to their teacher. Blonde brows had quirked with amusement at the attitude of her students. She opened the bag of flour up and Weiss gasped loudly. Ruby looked like she was about to pass out, all blood draining from her face.

“She murdered Blume,” the junior mumbled softly, body sagging. “Weiss, Ms. Goodwitch killed our daughter.”

“Hush, Ruby,” Weiss snapped, although Glynda Goodwitch was pretty sure she saw the older girl wipe away a few stray tears. “We always knew this day was coming.”

Shaking her head at the goofy nature of her students, she dug around the flour until she found the monitor and cry stimulator. Wiping them down before plugging the appropriate wires in to her computer, Goodwitch started to analyze the results. Her eyebrows shot into her hairline with her shock as she read and reread the results. Glancing up at the fidgeting teens before her, she decided to have mercy and tell them their scores.

“You two did perfectly,” Ms. Goodwitch said, a touch of shock coloring her tone. “I don’t think I’ve ever had a pair score so highly on this project before.”

Twin smiles of relief took over Ruby and Weiss’s face, with the younger of the two beginning to hop in place happily. Even though they’d lost their daughter, they’d won the war. And a free dinner.


	7. Day 7: Trust

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this prompt had me thinking of the iconic "do you trust me?' line from aladdin and i could NOT get it out of my head for the life of me. i decided to indulge my brain and make this an aladdin au, with all of the dialogue ripped from the movie. i am not claiming to own those words or the world of rwby, merely borrowing them for recreational use. apologies to anyone who isnt a huge disney fan.
> 
> this prompt is EXTREMELY short compared to the others, but if anyone is interested in me fleshing this out and turning it into a true AU, i have a bunch of the plot and characters pinned down. anywho, enjoy the chap! wr week is almost complete :)

“Do you trust me?”

“What?” Weiss asked, startled. She’d only just met this strange girl, but now she was asking her if she trusted her? But… against her own judgement, she _did_ trust her. Silver eyes shone from beneath a blood red hood, cape billowing in the wind as she stood just by the edge of a window. A scarred and calloused hand reached for her, begging for just a hint of trust from this intriguing stranger. The small dog at the girl’s side shifted his weight anxiously, turning to bark at his owner.

“I know, Zwei, I’m going!” The girl huffed, blowing hair from her face. It was almost as if she could understand her companion. Turning her silver gaze towards Weiss once more, she repeated her question, soft eyes imploring Weiss to give her a chance. “Do you trust me?”

Lips moving clumsily around her respond, she stuttered a “yes” just as the hooded figure grabbed her hand, tugging her to the window’s edge. “Then jump!” She shouted, never letting go of Weiss’s hand.

A rush of air greeted her, and then they were falling. Weiss has no idea how long she fell for, but she does know that she’d never like to fall from such a height ever again. Their combined weight broke through a tarp acting as a roof for a different building beneath them, and Weiss felt her disguise of beggar’s clothes shift in its place. They continued their plummet before the trio landed in a humongous pile of what seemed to be sand.

Zwei stood quickly and started sniffing the air, barking loudly as guards clothed in white skirted around the corner. Getting on to their feet and starting to run, Weiss’s companion was intercepted by a large guard she recognized from the castle. She thinks he went by the name of some common bird, but the one thing she was absolutely sure of was his malicious streak with her subjects.

“We just keep running into each other don’t we, street rat?” The large guard sneered as he grabbed the red cloaked figure and dragged her forward roughly. A low growl echoed through the alley that the guards were storming into, and then sharp canines were digging into the guard’s ankles. When he let out his grunt of pain and dropped his guard, the hooded girl headbutted the guard’s chin roughly, reaching for Weiss’s hand.

“Run! Go! Get out of here!” The girl shouted, tugging Weiss towards what she thought was freedom. Three more of the king’s men appeared, blocking off the entrance to the alleyway and their only means of escaping. 

A loud yelp of pain echoed through the slim space, and Weiss turned just in time to see the large guard from before roughly kick Zwei into a nearby vase. As his owner turned and began to run towards him, the guard grabbed her hood and aggressively threw her to his men. A wheeze snuck past her lips as her airway was suddenly blocked and she was forced to her knees.

“It’s the dungeons for you, girl,” The guard, (Cardin! Weiss remembered suddenly) laughed, and the princess began to panic. This was escalating far beyond what she’d originally assumed would happen. She never meant for her running from the castle to result in an innocent girl behind bars.

Feeling the need to do something, anything, Weiss ran forward and began beating her tiny fists against Cardin’s hulking frame. “Let her go!”

Cardin looked down on her, a malicious glint in his eyes. “Lookie here, men; a street mouse!” His statement was punctuated with a rough push, sending Weiss to the ground in a mess of limbs. Her body was aching from the jump she’d had to make for her escape, and now from colliding roughly with the firm dirt beneath her.

From her position on the ground, Weiss saw silver eyes worriedly darting between herself and Cardin. If she didn’t do something soon, both of them would be taken away! Thinking quickly, Weiss came up with a plan. It was horrible and would most definitely get her in trouble with her father, but it was all she had.

“Unhand her,” Weiss commanded, rising slowly from where she’d been thrown previously. Looking Cardin dead in the eye, she reached up and threw back her hood, letting her snowy locks flow free from her confines. “By order of the princess.” Realizing her stature didn’t look very intimidating, Weiss quickly put her hands on her hips, scowling up at Cardin in challenge.

Scattered gasps escaped the mouths of everyone in the area, and the guards were quickly tripping over themselves to bow lowly at Weiss’s feet. “Princess Weiss.”

“The princess?” The red clad girl choked out, eyes locked on Weiss’s hair.

“What are you doing outside the palace? And with this _street rat_?” Cardin asks shakily, unsure of the ground he stands on. He looks as if Weiss has just told him that he’s dying.

“That’s none of your concern; do as I command and release her!”

“Well I would, princess, except my orders come from Whitley. You’ll have to take it up with him.” Cardin says with a slightly careless shrug, grabbing Weiss’s companion by her hood and dragging her away. One of his partners grabs Zwei and carries him, mouth clamping the dog’s muzzle shut firmly.

As soon as Cardin had uttered Whitley’s name, she’d seen red. And not the beautiful shade of red that Zwei’s owner wore around her back, but a dangerous, angry sort of red. She’d had enough of Whitley meddling where he didn’t belong and picking on their citizens. Excited at the thought of finally confronting her brat of a younger brother, Weiss growled “Believe me, I will.”

-

Everyone knew who the Schnees were.

Their signature white hair and blue eyes alerted everyone that they spoke to that they were dealing with royalty. It was also common knowledge that the king had three heirs; two daughters and a son.

What wasn’t common knowledge was that the king’s eldest had abandoned her claim to the throne in favor of leading his national guard. The only two left in the running were his youngest daughter and only son. Usually the crown would have become the firstborn male’s birthright, but Atlas had been ruled by a queen before. While it was typically harder to get things done with their sibling kingdoms, it was not impossible.

Unbeknownst to the public, their king refused to allow his daughters the right to the crown unless they married. He didn’t trust a woman to do ‘a man’s job,’ as he put it. It was partly why Winter was so willing to step down and pursue something else.

Weiss absolutely did _not_ want the throne if she had to rule her father’s way.

It sure helped that she was a lesbian, so she _really_ didn’t want to rule with a husband by her side. She’d have preferred to rule by herself, but having someone to come home and complain to did sound enticing.

-

As Weiss is left standing in the alleyway, white hair and blue eyes exposed for the world to see, she is left thinking of some of the last words the red cloaked girl had said to her.

_Do you trust me?_


	8. Day 8: Free Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> k so i really thought i could write something longer for this, but im so so so exhausted from all the writing i did last minute this week that my brain is totally pooped. sorry if anyone expected something better to finish off the week :')  
> happy belated birthday to katie aka rubblesrose on tumblr. love u lots.

Ruby was scrolling through twitter watching every vine thread she could get her hands on before she stumbled upon a picture of the prettiest girl she’d ever seen in her life. Said picture belonged to a girl named Weiss, and she was replying to one of the vines in the thread Ruby was currently on by @ing a group of people. Ignoring the @s and going straight for the gold, Ruby clicked on Weiss’s profile and started to scroll through her pictures.

Hand clutched to her chest, Ruby let out a quiet ‘oof’ at the beauty before her. Every picture Ruby found was even more beautiful than the one before it, and she was struggling to wrap her mind around the fact that a girl like this even existed. Stumbling across a cute selfie with the hashtag “Gay Pride,” Ruby’s interest piqued intensely.

Scrolling up a little to read her bio, Ruby was shocked to see that Weiss lived in a big city an hour and a half away from where Ruby’s family home was. A small rainbow flag followed by her age, 21, were some of the only telling things the girl had about herself on her twitter. She had over a thousand followers and only followed about a hundred back, and Ruby was determined to become one of those hundred. Rushing back to where her tweets were held, Ruby started skimming in search of a significant other that may have been mentioned. After around thirty tweets and a whole lot of vines and memes, Ruby was satisfied with the lack of girlfriend or boyfriend on Weiss’s profile.

Seeing that the girl’s DMs were open to the public, Ruby grinned and pressed the button. Her fingers hovered over her keypad nervously, trying to think of a way to approach this intimidating specimen on her screen. Remembering that Weiss seemed to be interested in vines and memes, Ruby wracked her brain for one that was worthy to grace her DMs.

Struck with inspiration, Ruby rushed over to the vine thread she was just on. Making sure that she remembered Weiss’s twitter handle, she pressed the “share via DM” button and sent her desired vine to Weiss. Nervous for her response, Ruby decided to continue scrolling in order to distract herself. She wouldn’t be entirely upset if Weiss ignored her DM, but she would be embarrassed.

-

Feeling her phone vibrate from beside her, Weiss reached over blindly to see what app had notifications for her. Setting down the book she was reading, Weiss was slightly startled to see that she had a direct message from a twitter handle she didn’t recognize. It wasn’t unusual for people to ‘slide into her DMs’ as the kids say, but it was extremely rare that she actually entertained whoever messaged her.

Seeing that the sent message was a vine, Weiss felt one of her eyebrows raise. Pressing the video, Weiss was met with the sight of a small blonde girl in a large blue jacket, standing in what seemed to be a clothing store of sorts. Feeling a smile bloom on her face at the familiar vine, Weiss pressed play to hear the tiny girl utter the words “Hmm, cute. I wish I could get it, but…” as she grinned slyly at the camera and walked out of frame.

A small giggle erupted from Weiss’s throat at the gall of this ‘Ruby’ girl, and she decided to glance through her profile to see if she was relatively interesting. Opening up her avi, Weiss’s giggle died in her throat and she felt her mouth dry up. Ruby was one of the cutest girls she’d ever seen in her life, and Weiss had met Pyrrha Nikos. Taking a few minutes to soak in Ruby’s tousled hair and silver eyes, Weiss then swiped out of the picture to read her bio.

Ruby’s bio said that she was 19, on some level of the LGBTQ+ spectrum if the rainbow flag was any indication, and a ‘dog mom to Zwei’. Looking at Ruby’s location on twitter, Weiss’s giggles returned once she read that she was ‘just chillin in Cedar Rapids.’ Scrolling through Ruby’s pictures, Weiss quickly found many selfies of the young girl and a dog whom she assumed was Zwei. They made an adorable pair, Weiss admitted with a fond smile. Deciding that she was very willing to get to know this girl, Weiss began scrolling through some of the vine threads she had saved in her DMs with her friends. Finding her desired vine, Weiss eagerly pressed the correct options to send it to Ruby. Now all she had to do was wait for the other girl’s response.

-

A loud chime broke through the haze of Ruby’s slumber, and she raised her head with a loud yawn. Rubbing away at the drool that had made itself at home on the corner of her mouth, Ruby sat up and reached for her phone. Smiling sleepily at the DM notification from Weiss, Ruby rolled on to her back to respond to the girl.

After their initial flirting via vines, both Ruby and Weiss had followed each other on Twitter. The pair had been DMing back and forth for a week or two now and had become fast friends. Their dual love for vines and memes allowed them to easily communicate with each other, with random tweets being sent throughout the day if one half thought the other would enjoy it. Ruby had been over the moon when Weiss was able to smoothly flirt via vine and/or meme, and she’d been working up the nerve to ask Weiss if she wanted to catch a movie or something in a city that was equidistant from their hometowns.

Taking in a deep breath, Ruby quickly typed “weisswillyougoonadatewithme?” before pressing send and throwing her phone to the foot of her bed. Deciding that sleep was a good way to waste some time and avoid her small anxieties over Weiss’s response, Ruby buried her face in her pillow with a loud groan. If Ruby just ruined a vine filled friendship over her gayness, she would scream.

-

Weiss looked at the message on her screen with a blooming smile. Quickly finding the vine that featured the little blonde boy screaming ‘yes’ as a basketball was bounced off his head and sending it, Weiss pressed send before dancing in her seat. Who ever said romance was dead?

**Author's Note:**

> heyo, let's see how many of these bitches i can pump out on time. cant promise they'll all be the same length or anything, but hopefully they'll exist! as always, grazie in advance for any comments, kudos, or follows this may garner from you. my toomblr is octoputhy in case you wanna yell about wr, rwby, or any of my stories. i also run a BNHA discord server so you can ask for that link if you feel so inclined. happy pride month!  
> ALSO I FORGOT TO SAY! IF ANYONE IS INTERESTED IN THESE AS MORE THAN ONESHOTS U CAN LMK AND ILL ADD THEM TO MY TO-DO LIST OF AUS


End file.
